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The 'Myth' of the Silk Road
#33
Nathan Ross wrote:


I do quite like his suggestion that 'Daquin' was actually Ctesiphon though (or some sort of very distant notion of the Persian capital)!

 Yes some of the descriptions of Rome or Daqin are pretty far-fetched but the Chinese are relying on information supplied to them by other parties. I think Gan Ying received some fanciful information about their political system and goods they produced from Parthian or Greek sailors on his failed mission in 97AD to reach Roman territory (either Syria or Egypt but probably not Rome itself).

 The Weilu written around the third century AD during the “Three Kingdoms” period following the destruction of the Han dynasty seemed remarkably well informed about the Romans or their eastern provinces and Arabia and even the workings of the Nile, although the author (Rhezakhani that is) argues that the region discussed could be the Parthian empire (Persia and Mesopotamia)  west of Anxi while Anxi could refer to the satrapy of Parthia itself (a throwback to the old Achaemenid and Seleucid Empires) but by the time the Weilu was written the Parthian empire was destroyed by the Sassanids so to me that argument or theory doesn’t hold much water.

For his theory that the capital of Da quin being described is Ctesiphon, I don’t know myself but it should be noted that this description of the capital was written in the middle of the sixth century AD in the Weishu during the Northern Qi dynasty when the Western Roman Empire was long gone. It could well describe Ctesiphon but the Weishu has been criticized as sometimes unreliable so maybe information about the west was mixed up.

 I do agree with you that the author probably has a point about the fact that the Persians and the various Central Asian kingdoms have been downgraded somewhat but I just had to question his twisting of some of the sources to justify his arguments. Wink
Regards
Michael Kerr 
Michael Kerr
"You can conquer an empire from the back of a horse but you can't rule it from one"
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Messages In This Thread
The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Nathan Ross - 03-12-2017, 01:17 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Dan Howard - 03-12-2017, 02:08 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Michael Kerr - 03-12-2017, 04:41 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Nathan Ross - 03-12-2017, 08:52 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Dan Howard - 03-13-2017, 12:03 AM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Alanus - 03-13-2017, 05:00 AM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Nathan Ross - 03-13-2017, 12:28 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Michael Kerr - 03-13-2017, 03:16 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Nathan Ross - 03-13-2017, 07:26 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Alanus - 03-13-2017, 09:00 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Nathan Ross - 03-13-2017, 09:32 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Michael Kerr - 03-14-2017, 03:59 AM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Nathan Ross - 03-14-2017, 12:21 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Michael Kerr - 03-28-2017, 04:07 AM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Nathan Ross - 03-28-2017, 08:14 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Alanus - 03-29-2017, 03:47 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Bryan - 03-29-2017, 05:13 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Alanus - 03-29-2017, 07:37 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Bryan - 03-30-2017, 02:51 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Nathan Ross - 03-31-2017, 12:04 AM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Michael Kerr - 03-30-2017, 10:16 AM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Alanus - 03-30-2017, 10:39 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Michael Kerr - 03-31-2017, 12:31 AM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Michael Kerr - 04-04-2017, 04:52 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Michael Kerr - 04-13-2017, 03:47 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Nathan Ross - 04-15-2017, 06:38 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Michael Kerr - 04-16-2017, 01:09 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Nathan Ross - 06-25-2017, 06:44 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Mikeh55 - 06-28-2017, 05:17 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Michael Kerr - 06-28-2017, 05:39 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Nathan Ross - 06-28-2017, 11:00 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Michael Kerr - 06-30-2017, 05:45 PM
RE: The 'Myth' of the Silk Road - by Robert - 07-14-2017, 11:09 AM

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