The expedition of Zhang Qian in 138 BC is considered to be the foundation of the first ‘Silk Road’. On his return to Han China, his most important achievement was to demonstrate the possibility for ...

The Chang’an-Tian-shan Silk Road Corridor, one of the major arteries of the historic Silk Roads that opened up trade from China to the west, has become the first stretch of the Silk Road to be ...

Mr. Rakhimovich is currently the director of Penjikent archaeological base of the Institute of History, Archaeology and Ethnography after the name of A. Donish, Academy of Sciences of the Republic of ...

In 1967 Quaid-i-Azam University (QAU), Islamabad, was authorized by Ministry of Education, Government of Pakistan, to establish a Centre for the Study of the Civilizations of Central Asia in order to ...

SOAS, the School of Oriental and African Studies (University of London) is dedicated to the study of the languages, cultures and societies of Africa, Asia and the Middle East, and is the only Higher ...

Maps and travel accounts bear witness to the importance of Sri Lankan harbour cities since antiquity. The port city of Manthai, for instance, already appears in Ptolemy’s world map from the 2 nd ...

Ghengis Khan and his Mongol armies rose to power at the end of the twelfth century, at a moment when few opposing rulers could put up much resistance to them. The vast Mongol empire he created ...

The history of tea stretches back over thousands of years and spans not only the vast regions encompassed by the Silk Roads but much of the globe. It is well known that tea has been at the centre of ...

Research into the Palaeolithic cultures of Central Asia is perhaps the earliest glimpse we have of human societies living in this macro-region. The most extensive research has been carried out in ...

Religious movements and religions have had an important role on the history of the Silk Roads. It is notably the case of Buddhism which had a considerable influence on the early trade routes. Within ...

In 2003, local fishermen caught Chinese ceramics in their fishing nets in the Northern Java Sea, Indonesia. These objects belonged to a shipwreck known as the Cirebon wreck which sank in the Java Sea ...

The vast trade networks of the Silk Roads carried more than just merchandise and precious commodities. In fact, the constant movement and mixing of populations brought about the widespread ...