(East-West Question) Zhao Feng: Why do you say that the Silk Road is "the largest cultural common denominator in the world"?

  China News Agency, Hangzhou, June 1, Question: Why is the Silk Road "one of the largest cultural common denominators in the world"?

  ——Interview with Zhao Feng, Director of China National Silk Museum

  The author is strictly Xie Panpan Tong Xiaoyu

  In 2013, China issued the "Silk Road Economic Belt" and "21st Century Maritime Silk Road" major initiatives.

In the past ten years, the “Belt and Road” named after the Silk Road has become the most extensive and largest international cooperation platform in the world today, from concept to practice.

Going back to the origin, why is the “Belt and Road” named after the Silk Road?

What is the origin of the Silk Road?

Zhao Feng, curator of the China National Silk Museum and chairman of the International Silk Road Research Alliance (IASSRT), recently said in an exclusive interview with China News Agency "East and West Questions" that the Silk Road is the intersection of Eastern and Western civilizations connecting the Eurasian continent. It is "one of the largest cultural common divisors in the world".

The following is a summary of the interview transcript:

China News Service reporter: What is the origin of the Silk Road?

What special place does silk have in history?

Zhao Feng:

The name "Silk Road" was "invented" by the German geographer Richthofen more than 100 years ago.

In 1868, he first went to China to conduct a geological systematic survey.

After returning to China, he successively wrote and published five volumes with accompanying drawings, "China - The Achievements of Personal Travel and Research Based on It", in which he first proposed the Silk Road.

  In 1936, Richthofen's favorite protégé and explorer Sven Hedin published the book "The Silk Road".

With Sven Hedin's rise to fame and the book's bestsellers in Europe, the fame of the Silk Roads spread quickly.

  We have been thinking, if there is no silk, but items such as spices and ceramics, will East-West exchanges exist?

The answer is yes, but it will not play such an important role as silk.

  Why?

Because silk is a unique product in China.

A large number of archaeological discoveries have proved that the Chinese began to raise silkworms and weave them with silk about 5,000 years ago.

In the fourth century BC, Europeans did not know what silk was, and it was not until the middle of the second century AD that Europeans knew the origin of silk.

  By the time of the Roman Empire, the royal family and officials wore silk.

Why is silk sought after by western countries?

This is because there are only wool products in the area, and silk is not only delicate, but also brightly colored, which is a luxury.

It can be said that the Silk Road opened up a road of commerce and trade, and also opened a new era of exchanges between the East and the West in ancient times.

  Later, the properties of silk gradually changed.

  On the Silk Road, silk can be used for trade, such as buying camels, cars, etc. In the Tang Dynasty, the silk-horse market was prosperous, and the exchange of good horses for silk was the main content of the official silk trade.

  Silk was also an important military expenditure during the war.

When An Lushan attacked Luoyang during the An Lushan Rebellion in the Tang Dynasty, the famous general Feng Changqing opened the Luoyang treasury and distributed the brocade and silk in it as military expenses to 60,000 people in the market, and hurriedly organized military forces to defend against the rebels.

  Silk was also available for loan at that time.

For example, a Tang Dynasty lawsuit document unearthed in Turpan records that the Han merchant Li Shaojin once borrowed 275 horses for "training" from the Hu merchant Cao Lushan.

"Lian" is the highest level of silk.

Li Shaojin borrowed silk, not to sell it for money, but to use it as the principal to buy other things, and then sell it locally to earn the difference.

In the end, what he wants to pay back is not money, but "practice".

Moreover, what Li Shaojin borrowed was a "usury loan" with an interest rate of about 10%.

The embroidery of the lion pattern in the early Tang Dynasty is in the collection of the China National Silk Museum.

Photo courtesy of China National Silk Museum

China News Service: The Silk Road has witnessed and promoted cultural exchanges between the East and the West.

How did China influence the West through the Silk Road?

Zhao Feng:

The Silk Road was never meant to be "the way to sell silk".

It can be said that it connected many different civilizations in Asia, East Africa and Southern Europe through the merchants, herders, nobles along the way.

  For example, after Zhang Qian went to the Western Regions, he spread Chinese silk weaving technology.

There are two aspects to this technique.

  One is life science.

In human history, there are only two kinds of insects that have been domesticated to serve human beings-bees and silkworms, and silkworms were first domesticated by the Chinese.

Although India also has silk, it is all woven from wild silkworms and is not fine.

Western countries have always wanted to acquire sericulture and silk reeling techniques, but in ancient China, these were kept secret.

It was not until the sixth century AD that Europe acquired Chinese silkworm farming technology.

  The second technology is textile technology.

In the beginning, ancient China monopolized textile technology.

The spread of silk on the Silk Road brought a revolution to the textile technology of Western countries.

In the past, tapestries in Western countries were made by weaving or embroidery. No country used jacquard looms like China.

Later, the jacquard loom was spread abroad, and there was a profound exchange with the textile technology of western countries.

In the early Middle Ages, Europe had its own velvet brocade.

  The influence of the jacquard loom is not only in the textile industry, but even the invention of the electronic computer is also related to the jacquard loom in the Han Dynasty in China.

In the 19th century, Jacquard in Lyon, France transformed the jacquard loom of the Han Dynasty into a modern jacquard loom.

After that, a statistician developed a statistical tabulation machine following the principle of information calculation and storage of the Jacquard Jacquard machine, and on this basis developed the first card-type computers.

Although the current card computers are replaced by electronic computers, they are all binary storage concepts from the Jacquard program 0101.

  Of course, China's "national quintessence" and culture such as tea and porcelain have also entered the world from the Silk Road.

The Han Dynasty loom restored by the China National Silk Museum.

Photo courtesy of China National Silk Museum

China News Service: What did the Silk Road bring to China?

Zhao Feng:

For ancient China, the influence of the Silk Road was in clothing, food, transportation, entertainment and other aspects.

For example, camels became the main force of military logistics transportation and civilian trade in Central Asia and the Central Plains in the Tang Dynasty; cattle and other livestock originally in the Central Plains and the Yangtze River Basin were also imported from the Western Regions or the northern grasslands. development.

Crop varieties from Central Asia and West Asia were also introduced to China, such as pomegranate, grape, spinach, tomato, sweet potato and other fruits and vegetables, as well as various spices. Without the Silk Road, they would not have appeared on the dining table of the Chinese at that time.

  At the same time, the Silk Road also brought culture and religion to China.

The Buddhist culture from Tianzhu (ancient India) and the Sassanid Persian culture in Central and Western Asia were introduced into the Central Plains along with the northern nomads.

Nowadays, musical instruments that we are familiar with, such as pipa, gongs, cymbals, waist drums, etc., were also transmitted from the countries of the Western Regions to the Central Plains through the Silk Road.

  The Silk Road also led to the establishment of China's trading system.

The Silk Road is a trade route. The reason why it can last for thousands of years is the two points of honesty and trustworthiness, that is, the spirit of contract, which also gave birth to the insurance industry and mortgage loans in ancient China.

The cultural relics on the Silk Road witnessed the spread of Buddhism.

Photo by China News Agency reporter Sheng Jiapeng

China News Service reporter: It has been nearly ten years since the Belt and Road Initiative was proposed.

Why is it named after the Silk Road?

Zhao Feng:

The Silk Road is an abstract concept. It is considered to be the intersection of Eastern and Western civilizations connecting the Eurasian continent. It is used to explain how people exchanged goods, fashion, language, ideas, and beliefs.

  History also proves that for thousands of years, nomads or tribes, merchants, believers and academic investigators have been moving around along the Silk Road. Zhang Qian of the Western Han Dynasty opened the official passage to the Western Regions, the "Northwest Silk Road", heading north to the Mongolian Plateau, and then westward to the Tianshan Mountains. The "Prairie Silk Road" from the northern foothills into Central Asia, the "Southwest Silk Road" with rugged mountain roads from Xi'an to Chengdu and then India, and the "Maritime Silk Road" starting from coastal cities such as Guangzhou, Quanzhou, Hangzhou, Yangzhou, etc. "Wait.

  It was because of the charm of the Silk Road that Richthofen and Sven Hedin spread, but their influence was still in the academic world.

The Silk Road is truly appreciated by all mankind, thanks to the five international Silk Road investigations held by UNESCO from 1990 to 1995.

The study began in Xi'an, China, and aimed to promote all-round dialogue and exchanges between the East and the West.

UNESCO believes that the starting point of the Silk Road is China, which is not only a major economic and trade artery in history, but also an important route for exploring the cultures of countries along the route.

  In June 2014, the 38th World Heritage Conference passed a resolution to list "Silk Road: The Road Network of Chang'an-Tianshan Corridor" in the World Cultural Heritage List.

This corridor was jointly declared by China, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, involving a total of 33 Silk Road relics in the three countries.

The Silk Road Ruins Burana Ruins, also known as Balasagun City, is located in Tokmak City, the third largest city in Kyrgyzstan. It was built in the 10th century and was an important commercial and trade center on the ancient Silk Road.

China News Agency reporter Liu Xinshe

  There is a sentence in the value judgment of the corridor: the Silk Road is the largest cultural common denominator in the world.

It is not the patent of the Chinese, but the contribution of all countries along the way.

  Therefore, the "Belt and Road" initiative is named after the Silk Road, which reflects the joint participation of countries along the route. Just like the Silk Road in history, there are very active trade exchanges on this piece of land that stretches for tens of millions of kilometers. and people-to-people exchanges.

  Today we can also see that the "Belt and Road" has changed from an initiative to a practice, and has become the most extensive and largest international cooperation platform in the world today.

Some countries have built the first expressway and the first modern railway, some countries have developed their own automobile manufacturing industry for the first time, and some countries have solved the problem of power shortage that has plagued them for many years.

It has broken through ideology, social system, cultural differences, and obstacles between various countries and countries, allowing the fruits of open cooperation and development to benefit the people of all countries, allowing countries along the route to gain development opportunities, and the people of all countries have real A sense of participation, achievement, and happiness.

(Finish)

Interviewee Profile:

  Zhao Feng, Director of China National Silk Museum, Doctoral Supervisor of Donghua University and Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, Chairman of International Silk Road Research Alliance.

He has long been engaged in research on the history of textile technology, art archaeology on the Silk Road, and protection of textile cultural relics.

He has published more than 100 papers in both Chinese and English, and is the author of "The History of Chinese Silk Art", "Silk and the Silk Road in the Tang Dynasty", "Treasures of Weaving and Embroidery: A History of Chinese Silk Art", "Jincheng: Chinese Silk and the Silk Road", and "Chinese Silk Road". Design (Selected Edition)” and other about 20 kinds of books, editor-in-chief of “General History of Chinese Silk” and “Complete Works of Dunhuang Silk Art”, “Ancient Chinese Silk Design Material Diagram Series”, “Chinese Silk Art Series” and other series.

His works have won the China Publishing Government Award, the China Outstanding Publication Award, and have been selected for the National Publishing Fund Project, the National Key Publication Publishing Planning Project, the "Three Hundreds" Original Publishing Project, and the "China Good Book" for many times.