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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

#91

Post by 77pt77 »

dredmorbius wrote: post #79
77pt77 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

You seem to be arguing against your first comment to this thread. Why take an account from an author of dubious qualifications and veracity seriously if the most significant evidence of such an encounter is entirely lacking?

> Why take an account from an author of dubious qualifications and veracity seriously

Your reading comprehension is severely lacking.

I mean the next step for the Chinese is to take such bullshit as true and start laying claim to the Americas.

Clear now?

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#92

Post by 77pt77 »

maxglute wrote: post #84
dredmorbius wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I'm interpreting parent correctly, they're arguing that had the Chinese recently visited the Americas, the Portuguese and Spanish would have encountered native populations which were already decimated by disease. As this isn't the case, the epidemiological argument against shortly prior Chinese encounters with American populations is strong. That post Portuguese/Spanish contact native American populations were ann…

>native American populations were annihilated by disease is now well established fact Conveniently formulated historic fact absolving settlers IMO. Apropo to topic. Convincing argument from indigenous is that indigenous in NA didn't get wiped out "because of" disease, worst historic pandemics wipe out like 50% of population over ~10 years before some sort of immunity kicks into population and gen pop rebuilds a few g…

Smallpox alone killed way more than 50%.

I'm sorry but contact alone with people from Eurasia or Africa would have innevitably almost wiped out native american populations.

I don't think this is even debatable.

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#93

Post by thaumasiotes »

beezlebroxxxxxx wrote: post #46
thaumasiotes wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> aside from some relatively short-lived attempts at imperiogenesis in eastern Europe Hm? The Golden Horde seems to have lasted for a fairly respectable period of time as far as empires go. Mongol rule in Russia outlasted Mongol rule in China by more than a century.

Mongol rule in Russia posed no serious threat to western Europe in terms of imperial conquest. The horde was fragile on its western frontiers. Steppe invasions and conflicts on the east between the Mongols and Chinese empires shaped that area for millenia. Russia, as an outlier, if we consider it a part of Europe, is uniquely exposed to the steppes in a similar way to China. The Mongol threat to greater Europe, howev…

Why does that make their attempt at imperiogenesis in Eastern Europe "short-lived"?

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#94

Post by dredmorbius »

77pt77 wrote: post #90
dredmorbius wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I'm interpreting parent correctly, they're arguing that had the Chinese recently visited the Americas, the Portuguese and Spanish would have encountered native populations which were already decimated by disease. As this isn't the case, the epidemiological argument against shortly prior Chinese encounters with American populations is strong. That post Portuguese/Spanish contact native American populations were ann…

At least someone gets it.

Sometimes: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41157899>

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#95

Post by singularity2001 »

gumby wrote: post #8

Scouring trade route history is a two-edged sword: which way did influence run? I’m sure ideological archeology can solve that though. That path also has a lot of history.

I read a book with a collection of papers about the history of bronze in China and it was eye-opening how aggressively Chinese scientists fight the idea of bronze technology being introduced together with horses and chariots from the west.

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#96

Post by nsonha »

SubiculumCode wrote: post #15

The myth of China being China for millenia is such a propagandist rewrite of history in that region; I hate to see NYT headlines fall for it.

> myth of China being China for millenia

Pardon my ignorance but why is a culture's existence for millennia such an extraordinary fact that it has to be seen as a myth or popaganda? Did humans just pop out of nowhere?

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#97

Post by __rito__ »

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…

> whose name is a corruption of Alexandria

No.

Gandhara finds its name in way older documents such as Mahabharata. The people of Gandhara were called Gandharva. According to Mahabharata, these were people skilled in archery, wars, and also fine arts.

I am not sure about the history, but I am sure the name doesn’t come from Alexandria.

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#98

Post by namaria »

beloch wrote: post #60
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 archaeologis…

> truth is often a matter of perspective.

This is nonsense. Truth is patently objective. Narratives fail to get at truth, but that doesn't change the nature of truth.

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#99

Post by nuc1e0n »

aragonite wrote: post #87
nuc1e0n wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. They also did partial reconstuction work of the great wall in modern times and passed it off as ancient. Similarly, Stonehenge in the UK was also partially reconstructed in the 20th century. Sensoji temple in Tokyo was also rebuilt to its original design in the 1950s. The giant stone Buddhas of Afganistan could do with reconstructing IMHO as well.

> Yep. They also did partial reconstuction work of the great wall in modern times and passed it off as ancient. Do you have a source for "and passed it off as ancient"?

Not off the top of my head, but a lot of the misleading is done through omission, for which there is no source obviously. The stretch near Beijing gets a lot of tourists and by default they're led to believe they're walking on an ancient wonder. I think it's not made clear enough any of it was rebuilt in modern times, let alone which bits were. But also many historical buildings have been rebuilt multiple times over a long period of history.

With Sensoji, which pieces of wood represent the temple? It's a sort of ship of Theseus situation in any case.

Modern history is still history, and also forms part of the story to be told.

Re: Chinese archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road

#100

Post by nuc1e0n »

profsummergig wrote: post #85
nuc1e0n wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

From what I understand (and I could be wrong), Kandahar is the modern name of Gandhara.

That's what I thought as well, but clearly there's more debate there to be had than I realised. Was the city not founded by one of Alexander's generals or was it? Or ever called something like Iskanderha? I don't know.
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