2 ms·

Weird framing for this story, it's not an ancient find -- it was from the modern era, and not really part of the silk road, which A) probably never really exist

Weird framing for this story, it's not an ancient find -- it was from the modern era, and not really part of the silk road, which A) probably never really existed in the way people imagine it and B) definitely didn't exist at the time that his great grandfather was trading. The overland route from China to "the west" was mostly a mongol empire phenomenon that ended with the collapse of the Mongol and Byzantine empires and the beginning of the colonial area and the opening of sea routes. It was just an ordinary stop on an ordinary trading route.

alephnerd 2y ago
The writer sucked, but it wasn't an ordinary trading route. The border in that area was never truly delineated which lead to the Mughal-Qing Wars, the Great Game, and the India-Pakistan-China standoffs. Back when my great-grandad was young, the Brits, Russians, etc would recruit traders as spies and cartographers, becuase the High Himalaya route gave access to most of Inner Asia from South Asia. These same trade routes have now become highly monitored and contested highways and military supply routes that have lead to multiple India-China and India-Pakistan standoffs over the past several years. > It was just an ordinary stop on an ordinary trading route. For those of us from that region, we never get our story told. It's nice to see a western news outlet write about us outside of a braindead India-Pakistan-China story. > The overland route from China to "the west" was mostly a mongol empire phenomenon that ended with the collapse of the Mongol and Byzantine empires It wasn't the Silk Road, but until the 1962 Indo-China War, this was the only way Xinjiang and Tibet could be connected to mainland China as the fully weatherized highway connections weren't built until the 2000s.
AlotOfReading 2y ago
The overland silk roads spanned long before and after the Mongols, from the bronze age through the modern era. It doesn't have to be identical to Marco Polo's experience to be a silk road.

alephnerd 2y ago

The writer sucked, but it wasn't an ordinary trading route. The border in that area was never truly delineated which lead to the Mughal-Qing Wars, the Great Game, and the India-Pakistan-China standoffs. Back when my great-grandad was young, the Brits, Russians, etc would recruit traders as spies and cartographers, becuase the High Himalaya route gave access to most of Inner Asia from South Asia. These same trade routes have now become highly monitored and contested highways and military supply routes that have lead to multiple India-China and India-Pakistan standoffs over the past several years. > It was just an ordinary stop on an ordinary trading route. For those of us from that region, we never get our story told. It's nice to see a western news outlet write about us outside of a braindead India-Pakistan-China story. > The overland route from China to "the west" was mostly a mongol empire phenomenon that ended with the collapse of the Mongol and Byzantine empires It wasn't the Silk Road, but until the 1962 Indo-China War, this was the only way Xinjiang and Tibet could be connected to mainland China as the fully weatherized highway connections weren't built until the 2000s.

AlotOfReading 2y ago

The overland silk roads spanned long before and after the Mongols, from the bronze age through the modern era. It doesn't have to be identical to Marco Polo's experience to be a silk road.