China News Agency, Chengdu, January 20th: Huo Wei: Why did the "Plateau Silk Road" accelerate the civilization process of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau?
China News Agency reporter He Shaoqing, Yue Yitong, Xu Yangyi
"The reason why the Tubo Dynasty in the Tang Dynasty quickly crossed its early stage of cultural development is closely related to its rapid integration into the most important Asian civilization system at that time through the Plateau Silk Road."
Huo Wei, Distinguished Professor of Sichuan University, Curator of Sichuan University Museum, Dean of the School of History and Culture, and Director of the Chinese Archaeological Society, said in an exclusive interview with China News Agency "East-West Question" recently that the Plateau Silk Road is like a giant with open arms. Embrace the grassland Silk Road and the Desert Silk Road, embrace the Southern Silk Road and the Maritime Silk Road to the south, form a wider transportation network in time and space, and incorporate the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, which has always been regarded as a "forbidden zone for life", into Chinese and foreign cultures. communication system.
The following is a summary of the interview transcript:
China News Service: What is the relationship between the Plateau Silk Road and the desert and grassland Silk Road in the traditional sense of ancient China and the Maritime and Southern Silk Road?
Huo Wei:
Previous studies have rarely linked the Silk Road to the cold Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, and believed that the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau did not have the conditions to develop the Silk Road.
However, archaeological evidence and documents in recent years show that in the long history, the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau has never been a closed unit, and it has always maintained close ties with neighboring countries and regions.
The "Plateau Silk Road" does not refer to a specific road in a certain period, but refers to the transportation network and its main trunk lines that pass through the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau between the East and the West, China and the outside world.
Overlooking the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau from a high altitude, you can see the Desert Silk Road and the Grassland Silk Road to the north of the plateau, and the Maritime Silk Road and the Southern Silk Road to the south.
If there are still missing links in these Silk Roads in the past, the Plateau Silk Road just fills in, linking multiple Silk Road trunk lines into a whole.
The Kongtanglam mountain pass at an altitude of more than 5,200 meters in Ngari, Tibet.
The Panshan Road in the picture is a section of the "Plateau Silk Road".
Photo by China News Agency reporter Jiang Feibo
China News Agency reporter: How to prove that the "Plateau Silk Road" began to develop before the establishment of the Tubo Dynasty? Is the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau a "cultural island"?
Huo Wei:
The popular macaque decorations in the eastern foothills of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, the bronze mirrors with handles found in the early Metal Age in Tibet, the "Scythian-style" animal decorations found in ancient rock paintings and utensils on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, and the discovery of western Tibet in recent years. Archaeological evidences such as golden masks, silk and tea show that long before the establishment of the Tubo Dynasty, the ancient tribes of the Tibetan Plateau had had cultural exchanges with Central Asia and the Eurasian steppe.
The most striking discovery in recent years is that archaeologists have discovered a group of important tombs dating from the 3rd to 4th centuries AD in the western region of Tibet (in the past within the territory of Xiangxiong Kingdom).
The unearthed burial objects include silk woven with the Chinese character "wanghou", and tea residues contained in bronze utensils and wooden cases.
This kind of silk has also been unearthed in many archaeological sites such as the Astana cemetery in Turpan, Xinjiang, and the Yingpan cemetery in Xinjiang. It also bears the words "King Hu" and "Prince", and is generally considered to be produced by the Central Plains official or local weaving institutions , or as a gift item given to princes, nobles and tribal leaders in the frontier areas, or as high-end consumer goods specially made for the frontier areas. Without tea trees, India only has a history of growing tea for more than 200 years. The unearthed tea residues show that at least 1,800 years ago, tea had passed through a branch of the ancient Silk Road and was transported to the Ngari region of Tibet at an altitude of 4,500 meters.
Silk with Chinese characters unearthed in Ali, Tibet.
Photo courtesy of the interviewee
It can be seen that long before the Tubo Dynasty unified the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, the ancient tribes living in the Ngari area in the west of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau opened up passages to connect with the Silk Road, and transported luxury goods such as silk and tea from the Central Plains to Qinghai-Tibet. plateau.
The Plateau Silk Road was jointly created by people of all ethnic groups on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Xianbei and Tuyuhun from the northeast, Diqiang from the east, and Xiangxiong from the west have all actively participated in the historical process of building the Plateau Silk Road.
The above research results provide a grand historical background, and place the early human activities on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in the vast space where the Eurasian civilization meets to observe and think, rather than regard it as a closed "cultural island".
The origin of the Plateau Silk Road can be traced back to before the 7th century AD.
The western and northern areas of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau have established a considerable degree of contact and exchange with Xinjiang, Central Asia, South Asia and other places in the Western Regions in the Han and Jin Dynasties, so that the ancient tribes of the plateau have stepped out of the snow-covered plateau and integrated into the Eurasian civilization system. A step towards sexual meaning.
China News Service: What changes have taken place on the Plateau Silk Road in different historical periods?
Huo Wei:
The existing data can divide the history of transportation and communication between the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and the outside world into three important stages: one can be called the "pre-Tubo period" (or "Ancient Tibet period"), the main Refers to several signs of cultural exchanges between Tibet and the outside world that can be observed in archaeology before the formation of the Tubo Dynasty in the 7th century AD; the second is the period of the Tubo Dynasty (called the "Tubo Empire" by Western scholars), with the continuous expansion of the Tubo power and the control of The territory continues to expand, the scope of its communication with the outside world is wider, and the formed traffic routes and networks are more formed and complex on the basis of the previous development; the third is the "post-Tubo period" after the demise of the Tubo Dynasty in the 10th century AD. Some of the transportation routes continued to function, while others gradually declined and were later integrated into the transportation network of the emerging Yuan Empire across Eurasia in the 13th century.
The greatest contribution to the Silk Road on the Plateau during the Tubo Dynasty was the opening of the route from Chang'an to the Tubo capital Luosei (now Lhasa) after "harmony" with the Tang Dynasty, and then up the Yarlung Zangbo River and then southwards, until it reached the South Asia Nibala ( Today's Nepal), and then entered the "new way" of the ancient country of Tianzhu (ancient India).
Wang Xuance, the official envoy of the Tang Dynasty, made many missions to India, and it was precisely this international route opened in the early Tang Dynasty.
In 1990, I discovered the inscription on the cliff in the Tang Dynasty "Inscription on the Mission of Tianzhu in the Tang Dynasty" in Jilong County on the Sino-Nepalese border, which is the extremely important archaeological evidence left by Wang Xuance on this ancient road.
Nepalese trucks waiting for customs clearance at the Geelong port on the Sino-Nepalese border.
Photo by China News Agency reporter He Penglei
Part of "Inscriptions on the Ambassadors of the Tang Dynasty".
Photo courtesy of the interviewee
China News Agency reporter: How does the Silk Road on the Plateau accelerate the civilization process of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau?
Huo Wei:
The Plateau Silk Road is still a road of economics and trade and a road of seeking the law.
The newly unearthed data from Tibetan archaeology shows that during the "Han and Tang Dynasties", the material and spiritual civilization achievements of the Central Plains were continuously transported to the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau through the Plateau Silk Road, which greatly promoted the development of local productivity and social progress.
In addition to tea, silk and other Chinese "luxury goods", the historical records and legends brought by Princess Wencheng of Tang and Princess Jincheng when they went to Tibet have far-reaching influence, such as Chinese documents, religious etiquette, production tools, craftsmanship, and inland species. The opening of the Plateau Silk Road is closely related.
In 2013, the annual Tibetan Buddhism Geshe La Rangpa Degree Establishment Activity and Certificate Awarding Ceremony was held in front of the main hall of Sakyamuni at the Jokhang Temple in Lhasa.
The twelve-year-old statue of Sakyamuni in the Jokhang Temple was brought to Lhasa by Princess Wencheng of the Tang Dynasty to be worshipped here. Now this Buddha statue is still the belief of millions of Tibetan Buddhism believers.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Li Lin
During the Tubo Dynasty, many material civilizations and religious cultures from Central Asia, West Asia and South Asia were not only introduced to and influenced by Tubo, but also continued to spread eastward along the Plateau Silk Road, such as the gold and silverware of the Sogdian and Persian systems. , horse gear, polo, spices, jewelry, Persian and Dashi medicine, clothing patterns and decorations with Sogdian and Persian characteristics, etc.
Many religious cultures, such as Buddhism, Bonism, Zoroastrianism, Nestorianism, Manichaeism, etc., have also left some traces on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.
The statue of the Hu people rebounding the pipa on the Tibetan silver bottle in the Jokhang Temple in Lhasa.
Photo courtesy of the interviewee
In these broad fields and different levels of cultural exchanges, the Plateau Silk Road is like a "blood supply system", which continuously injects fresh blood into the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, accelerates its civilization process, and plays a role in the final integration of the ethnic groups on the plateau into the Chinese civilization system.
During the Tubo Dynasty, philosophy, religion and ideology were deeply influenced by the Han culture in the Tang Dynasty, and several factors of the "Han culture circle" were integrated into the "background" and foundation of its culture.
This shows that from the beginning of the establishment of the Tubo Dynasty, it has obvious tendencies in cultural psychology, cultural identity and cultural choice.
This objective fact reflects the convergence, integration and homogeneity between the Tibetan culture and the Han culture in the Tang Dynasty in the deep context, which is fundamentally different from the cultural exchanges between the Tubo and other countries and regions.
The Plateau Silk Road is like a giant with open arms, embracing the grassland Silk Road and the Desert Silk Road from the north, and the Southern Silk Road and the Maritime Silk Road to the south, forming a traffic network with a wider range of time and space. The Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, which is regarded as a "forbidden zone for life" by people, has been incorporated into the system of cultural exchange between China and foreign countries.
People can not only see the friendly exchanges between China and South Asian and Central Asian countries through the Plateau Silk Road, but also see how different civilizations learn from each other, share their beauty and share their beauty, and have a deeper understanding of the formation of a community with a shared future for mankind.
(Finish)
Interviewee Profile:
Huo Wei, Dean of the School of History and Culture (Tourism Institute) of Sichuan University and Curator of Sichuan University Museum.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Zhang Lang
霍巍，现任四川大学历史文化学院(旅游学院)院长、四川大学博物馆馆长、教育部人文社会科学重点研究基地四川大学中国藏学研究所所长等职，任国务院学科评议组考古学科召集人之一、国家社科基金评委、教育部本科教学指导委员会委员、中国考古学会理事、四川省史学会副会长、四川省博物馆学会副理事长等学术职务。