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Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

wsj.com

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Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#51

Post by Keysh »

nuc1e0n wrote: post #45

Travellers from Asia journeyed to the Greco-Bactrian kingdom of Ghandara (whose name is a corruption of Alexandria) and took Buddhism back with them to the east. This is fictionalised in the story 'Journey to the West'. Nippon TV in Japan did a cool TV series adaption of this story that was dubbed into English and shown on kids TV in the UK as 'Monkey', which was quite popular back in the day. If you spend enough tim…

Gandhara (not "Ghandara") is mentioned in the Behistun inscription of the Persian emperor Darius, from about two hundred years before Alexander, so it's clearly not "a corruption of Alexandria".

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#52

Post by dragonelite »

card_zero wrote: post #49
Spivak wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The West really isn't winning this one if that's your standard. The Mongol empire which amassed all the wealth, technology and military prowess of China during their expansion destroyed the Arabic world (arguably the most advanced civilization at the time), Russia, and the West they encountered like a bulldozer through wet cardboard. And did so with armies 1/3-1/5 the size of their opponents. We don't really acknowle…

I was reading about Keraites recently: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keraites Some of the invading Mongols were Christians, with a particular reverence for the biblical Magi (the three wise men), and Genghis Kahn, and his son, and his grandson Kublai Khan, all married into this group.

Thats not so weird before Christianity became big in Europe it was big in west and east Asia. At least from what i can remember from Peter Frankopan's book The Silkroads mentioned this. Also Dan carlins mongol series also talked about a big Christian king/savior in the far east.

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#53

Post by gumby »

Spivak wrote: post #36
coldtea wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> which way did influence run? Usually the way of the site of higher riches and more advanced technically, organizationally, etc, to the less one?

The West really isn't winning this one if that's your standard. The Mongol empire which amassed all the wealth, technology and military prowess of China during their expansion destroyed the Arabic world (arguably the most advanced civilization at the time), Russia, and the West they encountered like a bulldozer through wet cardboard. And did so with armies 1/3-1/5 the size of their opponents. We don't really acknowle…

The case of the Mongols was the example I was actually thinking of. But there’s a long history of ideologically interpreted archeology in the west as well.

I don’t understand why your comment was being voted down.

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#54

Post by Onavo »

nuc1e0n wrote: post #45

Travellers from Asia journeyed to the Greco-Bactrian kingdom of Ghandara (whose name is a corruption of Alexandria) and took Buddhism back with them to the east. This is fictionalised in the story 'Journey to the West'. Nippon TV in Japan did a cool TV series adaption of this story that was dubbed into English and shown on kids TV in the UK as 'Monkey', which was quite popular back in the day. If you spend enough tim…

> Nippon TV in Japan did a cool TV series adaption of this story that was dubbed into English and shown on kids TV in the UK as 'Monkey', which was quite popular back in the day.

Nah, HN readers might be more familiar with its anime adaptation, "Dragon Ball".

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#55

Post by nuc1e0n »

Keysh wrote: post #51
nuc1e0n wrote: post #45

Travellers from Asia journeyed to the Greco-Bactrian kingdom of Ghandara (whose name is a corruption of Alexandria) and took Buddhism back with them to the east. This is fictionalised in the story 'Journey to the West'. Nippon TV in Japan did a cool TV series adaption of this story that was dubbed into English and shown on kids TV in the UK as 'Monkey', which was quite popular back in the day. If you spend enough tim…

Gandhara (not "Ghandara") is mentioned in the Behistun inscription of the Persian emperor Darius, from about two hundred years before Alexander, so it's clearly not "a corruption of Alexandria".

Oh really? Maybe that's wrong then. Is the name a transcription or a translation? What script were the records written in originally? Names can be retroactively applied, especially in translation. Looks like I've got some reading to do. Edit: Maybe I got confused between different folk etymologies for the name of the city of Kandahar.

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#56

Post by nuc1e0n »

Onavo wrote: post #54
nuc1e0n wrote: post #45

Travellers from Asia journeyed to the Greco-Bactrian kingdom of Ghandara (whose name is a corruption of Alexandria) and took Buddhism back with them to the east. This is fictionalised in the story 'Journey to the West'. Nippon TV in Japan did a cool TV series adaption of this story that was dubbed into English and shown on kids TV in the UK as 'Monkey', which was quite popular back in the day. If you spend enough tim…

> Nippon TV in Japan did a cool TV series adaption of this story that was dubbed into English and shown on kids TV in the UK as 'Monkey', which was quite popular back in the day. Nah, HN readers might be more familiar with its anime adaptation, "Dragon Ball".

Interesting. I've not watched that show and didn't know it's the same story. I know the same graphic artist who worked on the design for the band Gorillaz also did idents based on this story for the Olympics in Beijing a few years back.

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#58

Post by tm-guimaraes »

77pt77 wrote: post #44
slater wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read that book when it came out. Really liked it, but, from that link: "The reasoning of 1421 is inexorably circular, its evidence spurious, its research derisory, its borrowings unacknowledged, its citations slipshod, and its assertions preposterous ... Examination of the book's central claims reveals they are uniformly without substance." Whelp!

If that were true, when the Portuguese and Spaniards got to tne new world 90% of the people would have died recently of disease. Those chinese ships were small floating cities and disease would have spread throughout the continent.

That did happen to the big Central American civilizations. Killing by a mix of inter conflicts and mass desease

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#59

Post by 77pt77 »

Spivak wrote: post #36
coldtea wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> which way did influence run? Usually the way of the site of higher riches and more advanced technically, organizationally, etc, to the less one?

The West really isn't winning this one if that's your standard. The Mongol empire which amassed all the wealth, technology and military prowess of China during their expansion destroyed the Arabic world (arguably the most advanced civilization at the time), Russia, and the West they encountered like a bulldozer through wet cardboard. And did so with armies 1/3-1/5 the size of their opponents. We don't really acknowle…

> just how lucky the west got with Temüjin dying and stopping the expansion that was literally right at our door.

For geographical reasons they would have gone further west than Germany.

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#60

Post by beloch »

ramblenode wrote: post #31

Unlike many commenters here, I actually read the article, and this quote seems to be the basis for the tenuous link between archeaology and geopolitics suggested by the title: > The extent to which present-day politics hovers over China’s archaeological ambitions became clear during a Wall Street Journal reporter’s encounter with an Uzbek researcher at the ruins of an ancient Kushan city near Chinor. “Tell the Chines…

Archaeology does not take place in a vacuum. It has always been a product of political human beings. Archaeologists are keenly aware of this. Mussolini excavated Pompeii with bulldozers to reveal the past greatness of Italy on a schedule compatible with his ambitions. British archaeologists conducted digs around the globe through the lens of empire. Natives in the Americas, to this day, hesitate to trust archaeologists because they have, far too often, ignored the culture and concerns of descendants while digging up their ancestors. Most archaeologists strive to tell the truth, but truth is often a matter of perspective.

It's not being anti-Chinese to observe that China is currently an expansionist totalitarian state, and that Chinese archaeologists will be under pressure to support a state-approved narrative. Their research should be viewed with their cultural context firmly in mind.

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