Religions of the Silk Road: Overland Trade and Cultural Exchange from Antiquity to the Fifteenth Century. By Richard C. Foltz. New York: St. Martins Press, 1999. 186 pp. $24.95.

The article studies the Alan-Abkhazian cultural contacts by analyzing architectural decorations of these peoples. Actuality of the study is determined by considering the architectural decorations as a cultural marker of Abkhazians and Alans in the period of the 8th—10th centuries. This point of consideration is primarily important for studying the material culture of the ethnic groups living in close proximity to the route of the Silk Road, which is regarded as a powerful catalyst for cultural exchange between the numerous tribes and peoples each having its own unique and diverse artistic skills. The article compares a number of artifacts: some fragments of the altar barrier from Anacopia (Republic of Abkhazia, New Athos) and some fragments of the altar barrier from the Ilyichevskoe Hillfort (Krasnodar Region, Otradnensky District). This allows the author to state that there existed common ornamental schemes in the monumental art of those peoples in the period preceding the 13th—14th centuries. The article analyzes the patterns and zoomorphic images of “animals in a heraldic pose” from the church on Mount Lashkendar (Republic of Abkhazia, Tkuarchalsky District), and a dog from the Alan tomb of the Kyafarskoe Hillfort (Karachay-Cherkess Republic, Zelenchuksky District), providing additional arguments for the animals’ identifi cation. The author explores the system of images of the Alan tomb to determine the semantics of the dog’s image in the Christian church’s decoration and comes to the conclusion that the symbolism of the dog’s image originates from pre-Christian beliefs (namely, those Zoroastrian). The article emphasizes the fruitfulness of studying the Alan-Abkhazian contacts using the example of architectural decoration: it makes possible to identify some images and specify their dates. The author offers a variant of identifi cation of the relief from Mount Lashkendar; defi nes the place of this unique monument in the course of formation of the original artistic culture of the Abkhazian Kingdom; notes the heterogeneous infl uences on this process, coming both from the territories of different regions of the Byzantine Empire (Constantinople, Cappadocia, etc.) and from Transcaucasia (Armenia, Georgia). The Alan-Abkhazian layer of cultural contacts is highlighted.

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The Silk Road Journey in the Marketplace as the Modern Time Pilgrimage

Literary Studies ◽

10.3126/litstud.v29i01.39596 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 29 (01) ◽

pp. 17-24

Author(s):

Dhruba Karki

Keyword(s):

New York ◽

San Francisco ◽

Hip Hop ◽

Silk Road ◽

Modern World ◽

Shopping Malls ◽

Sacred Sites ◽

Transformation Of Consciousness ◽

Celestial Sphere ◽

The Silk Road

The Silk Road journey embodies an individual's revelation, a universal process of transformation of consciousness. At times, people set for pilgrimages to holy sites; other times, they go on trekking through hills and mountains. Pilgrimages to sacred sites have been replaced by people's journey to discotheques, fashion centers and shopping malls in the marketplace in today’s corporate world. What binds them together is the transformation of consciousness along the journey from the terrestrial to the celestial sphere. Specific human, including pilgrimage and business trip become popular when people, ranging from children to adult across cultures make them significant parts of their lives. Sound and images of disco, jazz, hip-hop, and pop-rock have entered the streets and hotels in cities, from Lhasa to London, Shanghai to San Francisco, Karachi to Kathmandu, and Tokyo to New York. In today’s world of saturated media presence, images and icons of heroes and legends, motivated by commercial and popular appeal, are circulated with a greater speed, becoming simultaneously a shared mythic currency and continuity, the modern world embodiment of silk road business, and thus, crossing the East-West divide.

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Spanning Thousands of Miles and Years: Political Nostalgia and China's Revival of the Silk Road

International Studies Quarterly ◽

10.1093/isq/sqaa080 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Lina Benabdallah

Keyword(s):

Fifteenth Century ◽

Sand Dunes ◽

Silk Road ◽

Power Dynamics ◽

Politics Of Memory ◽

The Past ◽

History Of ◽

Positive Experiences ◽

Ancient Silk Road ◽

The Silk Road

Abstract The study of international relations (IR) has paid increasing attention over the last decade or so to the politics of memory, trauma, shame, but to a less extent to the political instrumentalization of positive experiences of the past. Indeed, IR theory rarely engaged the concept of nostalgia and its place within foreign policy making despite its potential for providing a powerful theoretical lens to explain hegemonic power dynamics. Sitting at the intersection of time and space, of time and affect, and of past and present, political nostalgia enables state leaders to move back and forth in time bringing back the past not for the past's sake but for the promise of a prosperous future. This article examines Chinese government's nostalgic borrowings from the Ancient Silk Road in order to associate Xi Jinping's new grand strategy, the New Silk Road to notions of inclusivity and prosperity. Reviving stories about fifteenth-century Chinese admiral Zheng He and reconstructing the history of his maritime navigations through stories and images of camel caravans crossing sand dunes are illustrations of political nostalgia.

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