ASNS2661 Final: Silk road

• School: University of Sydney
• Department: Asian Studies
• Course: ASNS2661
• Professor: all

Document Summary

The silk route served as the principal highway for trade and cultural exchange between the east and the west till the 13 century ad. The overland silk road has been thoroughly documented- there remains archaeological remains such as brick forts, palaces, painted caves and temples. The second ancient book about trade in the indian ocean guide to geography written around ad: his work remained the most detailed book on world geography for over a thousand years. Arabs of the abbasid period knew about and used the book. Potemaeous gave coordinates for 16 places in the golden peninsula, which were relatively accurate. These two texts show that commercial practises had already become standardised along the silk road of the sea by the time of the roman empire. How and when this happened is not known; we have no historical documents to guide us, only archaeological evidence.