The power of a kingdom lies with its horses
Who would have known there were kofun (3rd-7th century megalithic tombs) in Tochigi? I had always associated these ancient tumuli with the old capitals of Nara and Kyoto.
T was as surprised as I was when Makoto invited us to go and take a look. We stopped for lunch at organic wonder, Howdy & Cafe. One has to have lunch before setting out to visit a tomb after all!
I told Makoto that I was watching the classic NHK Silk road documentary, borrowed from the local library. His eyes lit up, "The one with music by Kitaro?" We are talking about "the" video! Said to have started the "silk road craze" in Japan, it doesn't hurt that Japan is also home to some of the most important relics from the Silk Road in existence.
I would say that Japan has been in its "silk road boom" (their expression not mine!) for the entire 18 years I have been here-- and sure enough, it all started with the production of this amazing video series.
Production began in 1979. The first volume was a joint-production between NHK and China's CCTV. Setting out from what is usually said to be the "terminus" of the Silk Road, Xian, the team heads West. Not using public transportation, their caravan of range rovers and a bus aims to get as close to the original routes as possible.
Yes, they go off-road.
Even 30 years ago, NHK is NHK. It is public television at its best. Of course, TV has come a long way in 30 years. Instead of digital high definition, the program has a narrator who wears this very unfortunate white "jungle" hat (like the helmets Japanese wore during WWII). Carrying a portable box-like audio recorder with microphone, he is from a different time and space!
China too must have changed a lot. In the filming, you see rural images that could have been taken a 1000 years ago. And, even in Xian, everyone is in gray Mao jackets and red caps, bicycles everywhere. Party officials ride through the crowded streets like hornets in their motorcycle side-cars. Its like those communist-era ballets that you see-- you can hardly believe your eyes.
And, of course, it's the tail end of the 70's, so you get the obligatory psychedelic shots of 12 arm goddesses moving to the rhythm of Kitaro's new age synthesizer.
That said, still, it was remarkable for its time. Not only was it one of the world's only joint TV productions with communist China, but it marked the first time in history that a foreign camera crew was allowed to film along the Silk Road-- within what has long been a closed country.
The team, departing from Xian to the narration of a poem by a Tang dynasty poet, immediately headed west ("west of the River") toward the famous Hexi Corridor. For this first stage, they remain east of the famed Jade Gate (which marked the historical end of China proper). Because they are East of the Gate, the lands they pass through the Corridor have long been considered part of China-- though they were controlled by Tibet off-and-on during Tang times and then by the Xixia during Song times (this is the time period of Inoue's Dunhuang of my recent post).
Following the Yellow River, if you look at a map you notice two things.
First, this 1000 kilometer long stretch of land is sandwiched in between towering mountains to the south and the Gobi desert to the north. There is only one way to go-- and that is straight ahead, as the path barely skirts the edges of the Gobi, hemmed in by the mountains. The second point is that control of this long and thin corridor is de facto control of trade to and from China. Therefore, it has always been of great strategic importance as there really was no other way in or out of the Empire.
The first real settelment they arrive at is the city of Lanzhou. It is truly another world: as here we have arrived in the Land of ancient Chinese garrisons, troublesome nomadic tribes and the Silk Road. There are four main garrison cities located along the Hexi Corridor. They are the gate city of Lanzhou, then moving west is Wuwei, Zhangye and finally Dunhuang. Just before reaching Dunhuang, in fact, on the Lanzhou-Urumqi railway line is the westernmost remaining segment of the Great Wall of China. To think that Wall reached this far West-- well, it boggles my mind. But then much boggles the mind along this road!
There isn't much to see at Lanzhou, so the team quickly pushes off. Their next stop is the garrison town of Wuwei, which was established as such during the Han dynasty (206 BC-220 AD) when the Chinese were finally able to oust the troublesome Xiongnu (aka, "the Huns") from the area. In honor of the accomplishment, they named the new town, "Wuwei," (武威) which means military prowess.
The Chinese had pushed into the area during the Han and it was in a Han dynasty tomb just outside of the town of Wuwei that the famous bronze Galloping Horse was dug up. It is an extremely important piece of Han sculpture that the Chinese Tourism Agency uses as their official logo (why I am not exactly sure). With all four legs in the air and its tail aloft as well, the great power of the animal as it soars is made apparent by the swallow that is shown just under its foot. The glorious horse has flown, surpassing even the flying swallows in the air.
A heavenly horse soars through the sky 天馬行空
Not coincidentally, horses play an extremely important role in the unfolding story of the Silk Road. At Dunhuang the Silk Road-- in order to avoid the desert of death-- splits into two roads: the Southern and Northern routes. The two routes then come together again at the town of Khotan. This is quite near the legendary area of the blood-sweating horses of Ferghana. Located on the southern banks of the Syr Darya (in Oxiana), Ferghana was in all probability populated by the descendants of Alexander the Great's Greek colonists. In this lush valley surrounded by the towering Pamirs , came the heavenly horses 天馬 which were celebrated for a thousand years in China.
China's many amazing accomplihsments are really all the more amazing when one consideres how early in history they were achieved. From astonishingly ancient times, China had become what was a huge agricultural country with a highly sophisticated social structure. During different times in the country's history, from Beijing stretching 2000 miles to the west (as well as along their western flank), China had had to contend with nomadic (and semi-nomadic) peoples who made up for their lack of sedentary culture with great military might. This military might was achieved through outstanding horsemanship and weaponry. From the Khitans to the Tanguts, from the Mongols to the Manchus, these people to the north were expert horsemen and archers. They were the reason, after all, why the Great Wall had been built and re-built for centuries.
So because of this situation, whether the Chinese liked it or not, their future was bound up in their own ability to fight on horseback. Training a calvary and keeping horses became top priority, and this was especially so during Tang times.
So magnificent, they were believed to have been descended from dragons, the horses of Ferghana were known as "celestial horses," horses of the air" and as "blood-sweating stallions." Both China and Persia vied for them and both countries at all costs sought to keep the supply lines open to their source in Central Asia.
Horses had been popular among emperors and aristocrats at least since Han times. It was the famed Han dynasty diplomat Zhang Qian (who-- such was his steadfast loyalty to his country-- really puts all future diplomats to shame!) who brought back tales of the horses of the heavenly mountain area of Ferghana. Dispatched by the Han Emperor in the 2nd century BC, his task was to travel west to find out more about the peoples of Central Asia.
At first, he didn't get very far at all as he was detained by the dreaded Xiongnu for 10 years! Finally managing to escape, his next stop was Ferghana. Known in Chinese as Duyuan (or the great Yuan people), the name is thought to come from he word, "yona" which was the word used to designate the Greek colonists of the area of the time. Official Zhang describes the people of Ferghana as being civilized and peaceful like the Parthians and Bactrians.
From Han times onward, the desire for these heavenly horses continued unabated, but it was during Tang times that the horse craze really took off in China. Tang art is known for its glorious silver metalwork and ebullient three color ceramics. It is also known for its horse paintings and sculpture. Indeed, during the middle Tang, so popular had horseback riding and polo become that women for the first time in Chinese history left their veils and robes behind in favor of men's trousers and low cut tops. The most popular hairstyle of the day was a swept-to-the-side hairdo known as a "thrown from the horse bun." Riding and polo was the aristocratic pastime par excellence during the Tang when women rode like men.
The art of calvary warfare required the best horses that money and silk could buy, and the horses of Ferghana became a great symbol of power-- both military power and the power of appropriate foreign policy. They also came to be associated with imperial power itself. The horse shown in the ink painting at the top of this post remains my all-time favorite Tang horse painting-- and miraculously it is now housed at the Met in New York. "Night Shining White" was the name of Emperor Xuanzang's favorite steed. The characters for his name--照夜白 means "illuminating the night white"-- in reference to the animal's brilliant lunar-white coat. He was the emperor's favorite steed and in art stood in for the emperor himself. Is he a still half-wild creature or is he dancing like some of the emperor's famed "dancing stallions"? That the picture has been be lovingly passed down for a millennium years is attested to be the colophons and seals on the scroll which span a thousand years of Chinese history.
The NHK documentary takes great pains to ensure that we keep in mind that this part of the silk road is as much about horses as it is about silk. And, not to state the obvious, but by Tang times, Chinese-style foreign policy can already be seen. Having colonies on the other side of the world never interested the Chinese. Their focus has always been on the lands which border their realm. And the further from thhe Centre, the less interested China became.
Keeping the North and West "pacified" and maintaining relations with important foreigner powers for the sole purpose of trade comprised the focus of Chinese-style foreign policy-- this mainly continues right down to today. This is a relationship which defines Central Asia and perhaps even ancient Persia as well. The great Russian Orientalist V.V. Bartold described as a symbiotic relation, calling it the "Steppe and the sown." Mutually independent, the steppe peoples and the sedentary civilizations have always had a very uneasy relationship. For 3000 years in fact, this uneasy balnce of power continued, with the steppe people posing a constant threat, China waivered between using trade and war to deal with them. And, horses were absolutely essential to this.
Fortified cities and armed fortresses were also bult the entire length of the country along China's northern border. If military help was required, great fires were lit sending huge smoke into the air which could be seen from the next lookout. In what had to be the world's most magnificent smoke relay signal in history, NHK says that a signal set in Dunhuang would reach the capital some 2000 kilometers away in half a day!
Anyway, from Wuwei, our team hit the road again. On the dusty and desolate road that skirts the Gobi, the announcer says, it's impossible to really believe they will come upon another town. And, yet, for a thousand years or more, travelers traveled along the Hexi Corridor in camel caravans. Departing from one oasis at dawn, they would walk half a day before reaching the next oasis that afternoon. It was slow going; the narrator says they averaged 40 kilometers a day.
There next stop would be the city of Zhangye. Known as Ganzhou in ancient times (this is the Kanji NHK uses which throws me off), Marco Polo stayed here for a year. In my post Pearls of the Taklamakan, I talk about at great length the Buddhist kingdoms of East Central Asia. For now, I will just reiterate what Susan Whitfield says in her Life Along the Silk road, that people tend to be thrown off by modern day Western China and Eastern Central Asia.
Nowadays, not only is the entire Central Asia region-- from the former Turkestan to Kashmir and on to Uighur country-- almost completely Muslim, but the people themselves are altogether different as well. Where now there are Turkic and Persian derived Muslims, there once existed here great Buddhist Kingdoms composed of Indo-Europeans.
Zangye was one of these great ancient Kingdoms. And as if Marco Polo's visit wasn't enough, Ganzhou has a Sleeping Buddha statue, dating from 596 AD(!) that is not only larger than the glorious Wat Po, but it is one of the largest sleeping Buddha statues on earth!
And speaking of the famous Venetian merchant, People still fight over whether Marco Polo even made it as far as China. However, Popo himself wrote that he stayed in Ganzhou for a year with his uncle on "business that is not worth mention." Hmmm.... The video showed a statue of Polo which stands today in the center of the modern town.
Zhangye is the largest oasis of the Hexi Corridor. Driving into town the road is lined with tall poplar trees. It reminds me of the town T lived in in Lesotho. You would drive into Mafeteng from the lunarscape of the high mountains of this Kingdom in the Clouds, and approaching the town, the road was lined on both side by tall poplar trees. Standing in two perfectly straight lines on either side of the perfectly straight road, the trees would wave gently in the wind. That is the typical oasis look-- a splash of green along the road as you approach.
Zhangye is dominated by its huge bell and drum tower (which dates from the Ming dynasty). As the camera does a closeup on the structure, the narrator mentions that 7th century documents from the town record that during the early Tang 27 different nationalities had permanent trading missions set up in the town-- not bad for the days before trains and airplanes, I'd say. In 609, the Sui Emperor himself traveled here to attend a grand trade fair that took place. Marco Polo waiting for permission from the Great Khan to travel further East, mentioned that the cosmopolitan town was full of temples and even had three Nestorian Churches which were "quite fine." And, speaking of the Great Khan, the temple of the Great Buddha is reportedly said to be the birthplace of Kublai Khan himself.
The video ends at the Western-most point of the Wall. Hundreds of soldiers were stationed here to defend "China" during Ming times. The Wall. It is said that rather than breaching the wall, Genghis Khan had just bribed his way in.
A wall is only as good as the soldiers who protect it after all explains our narrator, still in his unfortunate hat. From this point, the road leads to Dunhuang...
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Of Zhang Qian's extraordinary 2nd century BC mission, of 100 men dispatched only 2 made it back to the capital alive. French scholar Luce Boulnois takes time to describe the amazing manner in which-- Zhang Qian kept his imperial insignia safe during the entire course of his travels. Attached to a bamboo pole 2 meters high were three great tufts of tak's tail-- which was considered an emblem of power throughout Asia from very ancient times. Can you imagine? For what had to be 8000 or so kilometers roundtrip, he managed to keep a 2 meter tall bamboo standard safe from harm....
In the late 90s the China Institute in New York put on yet another unforgettable show. This one called Power and Virtue: The Horse in Chinese Art. The catalog remains one of two important books on the subject (You can see Shining White on the cover). You would be amazed at how many important Chinese works of art in the horse genre are kept in US museums. Below is a review of the exhibition that I thought worth giving offering the link to as well. It's here and is certainly worth reading. The Painting just above is by famed modern painter Xu Beihong.
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