絲路 與 石窟
絲路 與 石窟
SilkRoad and Grottoes
The Beginning
The beginning of the route that later was known as the Silk Road happened in BC139. At the time, The Han Dynasty had been engaging in a long war with the normadic Xiongnu who for generations had been attacking the norther borders of the Empire. In order to defeat Xiongnu who at the time occupied a large area of which now is known as the western part Gansu Province and XingJiang, Emporor Wu of the Han Dynasty intended to form aliances with 2 other groups of normads Yuezhi and Wusun, he dispatched a special envoy Zhang Qian to find Yuezhi and Wusun. The lands west of Gangsu was unknown territory to Chinese at the time.
After almost 11 years of hash journey, Zhang Qian managed to find Yuezhi in an area which now in Kazakhstan, but Yuezhi refused to form aliance with the Han Dynasty. It took Zhang Qian another few years of time to return to ChangAn to report back to Emporor Wu. Even though he was not able to complete the original mission, nonetheless, he brought back large amount of geograhic and demographic information about land, people and culture of the western land. From there on, Chinese historians started to use the term "Xi Yu" (means Western Domain) to refer to what's now known as Gangsu and XingJiang.
In BC121, Emporor Wu sent his army westward, defeated and drove away Xiongnu in what's now Gangsu area, he then formed 2 counties, WuWei and JiuQuan. Later in BC111, Emporor Wu ordered the forming of 2 more counties ZhangYe and DunHuang along with 2 forts YuMen Guan and Yang Guan that overseeing the west most frontiers.
The picture in this page came from a bigger mural from Cave 323 of the MoGao Grottoes. The man on his knees was Zhang Qian, the man on horse back was Emporor Wu. This picture illustrates a scene that Zhang Qian bid Emporer Wu farewell before heading off.
Picture was taken at the Silk Road Exhibition at Shan Xi Province Museum at Xi An.
This 4 counties and 2 forts together were known as the He Xi Corridor which literally means a corridor at the west band of Yellow River. It became the core route of the Silk Road at later time. Around AD100, Buddhism was spreaded to ChangAn (capital city of Han Dynasty) through Xi Yu and the He Xi Corridor.