The silk road is the ancient transcontinental network of trade routes that connected the East with the West. The term was probably first used as the German term Seidenstraße (“the Silk Road”), coined by the German Geographer Ferdinand von Richthofen, who made seven expeditions to China from 1868 to 1872. He named it ‘silk’ as it was the major export to Europe, and was the representative handicraft of China.
Traders on this route included the Bactrians, Sogdians, Syrians, Jews, Arabs, Iranians, Turkmens, Chinese, Malays, Indians, Somalis, Greeks, Romans, Georgians, and Azerbaijanians. These vast networks carried more than just merchandise and precious commodities: the constant movement and mixing of populations also brought about the transmission of knowledge, ideas, cultures, technologies, art and literature, which had a profound impact on the history and civilizations of the Eurasian people. Though some trade had been carried out since 2nd century BC, the first major ‘road’ was the Persian Royal Road constructed by the Achaemenid Empire in 500 BC.
Recently, in September 2013, during a visit to Kazakhstan, Chinese President Xi Jinping introduced a plan for a New Silk Road from China to Europe called ‘’One Belt One Road’.
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From the desk of Aditya Khanduri
About me (Why I started Polygyan)
