glassware of various colours.
Several years later a Daqin craftsman is mentioned as showing the Chinese how to make "
flints into crystal by means of fire", a curiosity to the Chinese.
[Yule (1915), p. 53; see footnotes #4–5.]
Another embassy from Daqin is recorded as bringing tributary gifts to the Chinese
Jin Empire (266–420 AD).
This occurred in 284 AD during the reign of
Emperor Wu of Jin
Emperor Wu of Jin (; 236 – 16 May 290), personal name Sima Yan (), courtesy name Anshi (安世), was the grandson of Sima Yi, nephew of Sima Shi and son of Sima Zhao. He became the first emperor of the Jin dynasty after forcing Cao Huan, ...
(r. 266–290 AD), and was recorded in the ''
Book of Jin
The ''Book of Jin'' is an official Chinese historical text covering the history of the Jin dynasty from 266 to 420. It was compiled in 648 by a number of officials commissioned by the imperial court of the Tang dynasty, with chancellor Fang ...
'', as well as the later ''
Wenxian Tongkao
The ''Wenxian Tongkao'' () or ''Tongkao'' was one of the model works of the '' Tongdian'' compiled by Ma Duanlin in 1317, during the Yuan Dynasty.
References
*Dong, Enlin, et al. (2002). ''Historical Literature and Cultural Studies''. Wuhan: Hube ...
''.
This embassy was presumably sent by the Emperor
Carus (r. 282–283 AD), whose brief reign was
preoccupied by war with
Sasanian Persia
The Sasanian () or Sassanid Empire, officially known as the Empire of Iranians (, ) and also referred to by historians as the Neo-Persian Empire, was the last Iranian empire before the early Muslim conquests of the 7th-8th centuries AD. Named ...
.
[Yule (1915), pp. 53–54.]
Fulin: Eastern Roman embassies
Chinese histories for the
Tang dynasty
The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, t= ), or Tang Empire, was an imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907 AD, with an interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdom ...
(618–907 AD) record contacts with merchants from "Fulin" (), the new name used to designate the Byzantine Empire.
[Wilkinson (2000), p. 730, footnote #14.] The first reported diplomatic contact took place in 643 AD during the reigns of
Constans II (641–668 AD) and
Emperor Taizong of Tang
Emperor Taizong of Tang (28January 59810July 649), previously Prince of Qin, personal name Li Shimin, was the second emperor of the Tang dynasty of China, ruling from 626 to 649. He is traditionally regarded as a co-founder of the dynasty ...
(626–649 AD).
The ''
Old Book of Tang'', followed by the ''
New Book of Tang'', provides the name "Po-to-li" (,
pinyin
Hanyu Pinyin (), often shortened to just pinyin, is the official romanization system for Standard Chinese, Standard Mandarin Chinese in China, and to some extent, in Singapore and Malaysia. It is often used to teach Mandarin, normally writte ...
: ''Bōduōlì'') for Constans II, which Hirth conjectured to be a transliteration of ''Kōnstantinos Pogonatos'', or "Constantine the Bearded", giving him the title of a
king
King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen, which title is also given to the consort of a king.
*In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contemporary indigenous peoples, the tit ...
(王 ''wáng'').
Yule and S. A. M. Adshead offer a different transliteration stemming from "
patriarch
The highest-ranking bishops in Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy, the Catholic Church (above major archbishop and primate), the Hussite Church, Church of the East, and some Independent Catholic Churches are termed patriarchs (and in certai ...
" or "
patrician
Patrician may refer to:
* Patrician (ancient Rome), the original aristocratic families of ancient Rome, and a synonym for "aristocratic" in modern English usage
* Patrician (post-Roman Europe), the governing elites of cities in parts of medieval ...
", possibly a reference to one of the acting
regent
A regent (from Latin : ruling, governing) is a person appointed to govern a state '' pro tempore'' (Latin: 'for the time being') because the monarch is a minor, absent, incapacitated or unable to discharge the powers and duties of the monarchy ...
s for the 13-year-old Byzantine monarch.
[Adshead (1995) 988 p. 105.] The Tang histories record that Constans II sent an embassy in the 17th year of the Zhenguan () regnal period (643 AD), bearing gifts of
red glass and green
gemstones.
Yule points out that
Yazdegerd III
Yazdegerd III (also spelled Yazdgerd III and Yazdgird III; pal, 𐭩𐭦𐭣𐭪𐭥𐭲𐭩) was the last Sasanian King of Kings of Iran from 632 to 651. His father was Shahriyar and his grandfather was Khosrow II.
Ascending the throne at the ...
(r. 632–651 AD), last ruler of the Sasanian Empire, sent diplomats to China to secure aid from Emperor Taizong (
considered the suzerain over
Ferghana in Central Asia) during the loss of the
Persian heartland to the Islamic
Rashidun Caliphate, which may also have prompted the Byzantines to send envoys to China amid their
recent loss of Syria to the Muslims. Tang Chinese sources also recorded how Sasanian prince
Peroz III
Peroz III ( pal, 𐭯𐭩𐭫𐭥𐭰 ''Pērōz''; ) was son of Yazdegerd III, the last Sasanian King of Kings of Iran. After the death of his father, who legend says was killed by a miller at the instigation of the governor of Marw, he retreated ...
(636–679 AD) fled to Tang China following the
conquest of Persia by the growing Islamic caliphate.
Yule asserts that the additional Fulin embassies during the Tang period arrived in 711 and 719 AD, with another in 742 AD that may have been Nestorian monks. Adshead lists four official diplomatic contacts with Fulin in the ''Old Book of Tang'' as occurring in 643, 667, 701, and 719 AD. He speculates that the absence of these missions in Western literary sources can be explained by how the Byzantines typically viewed political relations with powers of the East, as well as the possibility that they were launched on behalf of frontier officials instead of
the central government.
[Adshead (1995) 988 p. 104.] Yule and Adshead concur that a Fulin diplomatic mission occurred during the reign of
Justinian II
Justinian II ( la, Iustinianus; gr, Ἰουστινιανός, Ioustinianós; 668/69 – 4 November 711), nicknamed "the Slit-Nosed" ( la, Rhinotmetus; gr, ὁ Ῥινότμητος, ho Rhinótmētos), was the last Eastern Roman emperor of the ...
(r. 685–695 AD; 705–711 AD). Yule claims it occurred in the year of the emperor's death, 711 AD, whereas Adshead contends that it took place in 701 AD during the usurpation of
Leontios
Leontius ( el, Λεόντιος, Leóntios; – 15 February 706), was Byzantine emperor from 695 to 698. Little is known of his early life, other than that he was born in Isauria in Asia Minor. He was given the title of ''patrikios'', and mad ...
and the emperor's exile in
Crimea
Crimea, crh, Къырым, Qırım, grc, Κιμμερία / Ταυρική, translit=Kimmería / Taurikḗ ( ) is a peninsula in Ukraine, on the northern coast of the Black Sea, that has been occupied by Russia since 2014. It has a pop ...
, perhaps the reason for its omission in
Byzantine records and the source for confusion in Chinese histories about precisely who sent this embassy.
[Adshead (1995), pp. 105–106.] Justinian II regained the throne with the aid of
Bulgars and a marriage alliance with the
Khazars
The Khazars ; he, כּוּזָרִים, Kūzārīm; la, Gazari, or ; zh, 突厥曷薩 ; 突厥可薩 ''Tūjué Kěsà'', () were a semi-nomadic Turkic people that in the late 6th-century CE established a major commercial empire coverin ...
. Adshead therefore believes a mission sent to Tang China would be consistent with Justinian II's behaviour, especially if he had knowledge of the permission
Empress Wu Zetian
Wu Zetian (17 February 624 – 16 December 705), personal name Wu Zhao, was the ''de facto'' ruler of the Tang dynasty from 665 to 705, ruling first through others and then (from 690) in her own right. From 665 to 690, she was first empres ...
granted to
Narsieh
Narsieh ( pal, 𐭭𐭥𐭮𐭧𐭩 ''Narseh''; ) was a Persian general who fled to the Tang dynasty with his father Peroz III, son of Yazdegerd III, the last Sassanid emperor of Persia, after the Muslim conquest of Persia.
He was escorted back ...
, son of Peroz III, to march against the Arabs in Central Asia at the end of the 7th century.
The 719 AD a Fulin embassy ostensibly came from
Leo III the Isaurian
Leo III the Isaurian ( gr, Λέων ὁ Ἴσαυρος, Leōn ho Isauros; la, Leo Isaurus; 685 – 18 June 741), also known as the Syrian, was Byzantine Emperor from 717 until his death in 741 and founder of the Isaurian dynasty. He put an e ...
(r. 717–741 AD) to the court of
Emperor Xuanzong of Tang (r. 712–756 AD), during a time when the Byzantine emperor was again reaching out to Eastern powers with a renewed Khazar marriage alliance.
[Adshead (1995) 988 p. 106.] It also came as Leo III had just defeated the Arabs in 717 CE.
The Chinese annals record that "In the first month of the seventh year of the period
Kaiyuan 19 CE
AD 19 ( XIX) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Silanus and Balbus (or, less frequently, year 772 ''Ab urbe condita''). ...
their lord
菻王, "the King of Fulin"sent the Ta-shou-ling
n officer of high rankof T'u-huo-lo
Tokhara
Tokharistan (formed from "Tokhara" and the suffix ''-stan'' meaning "place of" in Persian) is an ancient Early Middle Ages name given to the area which was known as Bactria in Ancient Greek sources.
In the 7th and 8th century CE, Tokharistan c ...
] (...) to offer lions and ling-yang [antelopes], two of each. A few months after, he further sent Ta-te-seng ["priests of great virtue"] to our court with tribute." During its long voyage, this embassy probably visited the
Turk Shahis
The Turk Shahis or Kabul Shahis were a dynasty of Western Turk, or mixed Turko- Hephthalite, origin, that ruled from Kabul and Kapisa to Gandhara in the 7th to 9th centuries AD.
They may have been of Khalaj ethnicity."The new rulers of Kabu ...
king of
Afghanistan
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...
, since the son of the king took the title "
Fromo Kesaro" when he acceded to the throne in 739 CE.
"
Fromo Kesaro" is a phonetic transcription of "Roman Caesar", probably chosen in honor of "Caesar", the title of Leo III, who had defeated their common enemy the Arabs.
In Chinese sources "Fromo Kesaro" was aptly transcribed ''"Fulin Jisuo"'' (拂菻罽娑), "
Fulin" (拂菻) being the standard
Tang Dynasty
The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, t= ), or Tang Empire, was an imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907 AD, with an interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdom ...
name for "
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...
".
The year of this embassy coincided with Xuanzong's refusal to provide aid to the
Sogdians of
Bukhara and
Samarkand against the
Arab invasion force.
An embassy from the Umayyad Caliphate was received by the Tang court in 732 AD. However, the Arab victory at the 751 AD
Battle of Talas and the
An Lushan Rebellion
The An Lushan Rebellion was an uprising against the Tang dynasty of China towards the mid-point of the dynasty (from 755 to 763), with an attempt to replace it with the Yan dynasty. The rebellion was originally led by An Lushan, a general offi ...
crippled Tang Chinese interventionist efforts in Central Asia.
The last diplomatic contacts with Fulin are recorded as having taken place in the 11th century AD. From the ''Wenxian Tongkao'', written by historian
Ma Duanlin
''Mă Duānlín'' () (1245–1322) was a Chinese historical writer and encyclopaedist. In 1317, during the Yuan Dynasty, he published the comprehensive Chinese encyclopedia ''Wenxian Tongkao'' in 348 volumes.
He was born to the family of Southern ...
(1245–1322), and from the ''
History of Song'', it is known that the Byzantine emperor
Michael VII Parapinakēs Caesar (, ''Mie li sha ling kai sa'') of Fulin sent an embassy to China's
Song dynasty
The Song dynasty (; ; 960–1279) was an imperial dynasty of China that began in 960 and lasted until 1279. The dynasty was founded by Emperor Taizu of Song following his usurpation of the throne of the Later Zhou. The Song conquered the rest ...
that arrived in 1081 AD, during the reign of
Emperor Shenzong of Song
Emperor Shenzong of Song (25 May 1048 – 1 April 1085), personal name Zhao Xu, was the sixth emperor of the Song dynasty of China. His original personal name was Zhao Zhongzhen but he changed it to "Zhao Xu" after his coronation. He reigned f ...
(r. 1067–1085 AD).
[Sezgin (1996), p. 25.] The ''History of Song'' described the tributary gifts given by the Byzantine embassy as well as the products made in Byzantium. It also described punishments used in
Byzantine law
Byzantine law was essentially a continuation of Roman law with increased Orthodox Christian and Hellenistic influence. Most sources define ''Byzantine law'' as the Roman legal traditions starting after the reign of Justinian I in the 6th century ...
, such as the
capital punishment
Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the state-sanctioned practice of deliberately killing a person as a punishment for an actual or supposed crime, usually following an authorized, rule-governed process to conclude that t ...
of being stuffed into a "feather bag" and thrown into the sea,
probably the Romano-Byzantine practice of ''
poena cullei
''Poena cullei'' (from Latin 'penalty of the sack') under Roman law was a type of death penalty imposed on a subject who had been found guilty of patricide. The punishment consisted of being sewn up in a leather sack, with an assortment of live a ...
'' (from
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
'penalty of the sack'). The final recorded embassy arrived in 1091 AD, during the reign of
Alexios I Komnenos
Alexios I Komnenos ( grc-gre, Ἀλέξιος Κομνηνός, 1057 – 15 August 1118; Latinized Alexius I Comnenus) was Byzantine emperor from 1081 to 1118. Although he was not the first emperor of the Komnenian dynasty, it was during ...
(r. 1081–1118 AD); this event is only mentioned in passing.
The ''
History of Yuan
The ''History of Yuan'' (''Yuán Shǐ''), also known as the ''Yuanshi'', is one of the official Chinese historical works known as the ''Twenty-Four Histories'' of China. Commissioned by the court of the Ming dynasty, in accordance to political ...
'' offers a biography of a Byzantine man named Ai-sie (transliteration of either Joshua or Joseph), who originally served the court of
Güyük Khan
Güyük (also Güyug;; ''c''. March 19, 1206 – April 20, 1248) was the third Khagan-Emperor of the Mongol Empire, the eldest son of Ögedei Khan and a grandson of Genghis Khan. He reigned from 1246 to 1248.
Appearance
According to Giovann ...
but later became a head
astronomer
An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, moons, comets and galaxies – in either ...
and
physician
A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...
for the court of
Kublai Khan, the Mongol founder of the
Yuan dynasty
The Yuan dynasty (), officially the Great Yuan (; xng, , , literally "Great Yuan State"), was a Mongol-led imperial dynasty of China and a successor state to the Mongol Empire after its division. It was established by Kublai, the fift ...
(1271–1368 AD), at
Khanbaliq (modern
Beijing
}
Beijing ( ; ; ), alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the capital of the People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's most populous national capital city, with over 21 ...
).
[ Bretschneider (1888), p. 144.] He was eventually granted the title Prince of Fulin (, ''Fúlǐn wáng'') and his children were listed with their
Chinese name
Chinese names or Chinese personal names are names used by individuals from Greater China and other parts of the Chinese-speaking world throughout East and Southeast Asia (ESEA). In addition, many names used in Japan, Korea and Vietnam are ofte ...
s, which seem to match with transliterations of the
Christian names Elias, Luke, and Antony.
Kublai Khan is also known to have sent Nestorian monks, including
Rabban Bar Sauma
Rabban Bar Ṣawma (Syriac language: , ; 1220January 1294), also known as Rabban Ṣawma or Rabban ÇaumaMantran, p. 298 (), was a Turkic Chinese ( Uyghur or possibly Ongud) monk turned diplomat of the "Nestorian" Church of the East in China. ...
, to the court of Byzantine ruler
Andronikos II Palaiologos (r. 1282–1328 AD), whose
half-sisters were married to the great-grandsons of
Genghis Khan, making this Byzantine ruler an
in-law with the Mongol ruler in Beijing.
Within the
Mongol Empire, which
eventually included all of China, there were enough Westerners travelling there that in 1340 AD
Francesco Balducci Pegolotti Pegolotti Pratica Ricc.2441 specimen half page.
Francesco Balducci Pegolotti (fl. 1290 – 1347), also Francesco di Balduccio, was a Florentine merchant and politician.
Life
His father, Balduccio Pegolotti, represented Florence in commercial neg ...
compiled a
guide book
A guide book or travel guide is "a book of information about a place designed for the use of visitors or tourists". It will usually include information about sights, accommodation, restaurants, transportation, and activities. Maps of varying det ...
for fellow merchants on how to exchange silver for
paper money
A banknote—also called a bill (North American English), paper money, or simply a note—is a type of negotiable promissory note, made by a bank or other licensed authority, payable to the bearer on demand.
Banknotes were originally issued ...
to purchase silk
in Khanbaliq (Beijing). By this stage the Eastern Roman Empire, temporarily dismantled by the
Latin Empire
The Latin Empire, also referred to as the Latin Empire of Constantinople, was a feudal Crusader state founded by the leaders of the Fourth Crusade on lands captured from the Byzantine Empire. The Latin Empire was intended to replace the Byzant ...
, had shrunk to the size of a rump state in
parts of Greece and
Anatolia
Anatolia, tr, Anadolu Yarımadası), and the Anatolian plateau, also known as Asia Minor, is a large peninsula in Western Asia and the westernmost protrusion of the Asian continent. It constitutes the major part of modern-day Turkey. The ...
.
Ma Duanlin
''Mă Duānlín'' () (1245–1322) was a Chinese historical writer and encyclopaedist. In 1317, during the Yuan Dynasty, he published the comprehensive Chinese encyclopedia ''Wenxian Tongkao'' in 348 volumes.
He was born to the family of Southern ...
, author of the ''Wenxian Tongkao'', noted the shifting political boundaries, albeit based on generally inaccurate and distorted
political geography.
He wrote that historians of the Tang Dynasty considered "Daqin" and "Fulin" to be the same country, but he had his reservations about this due to discrepancies in geographical accounts and other concerns (
Wade–Giles
Wade–Giles () is a romanization system for Mandarin Chinese. It developed from a system produced by Thomas Francis Wade, during the mid-19th century, and was given completed form with Herbert A. Giles's '' Chinese–English Dictionary'' o ...
spelling):
The ''
History of Ming
The ''History of Ming'' or the ''Ming History'' (''Míng Shǐ'') is one of the official Chinese historical works known as the ''Twenty-Four Histories''. It consists of 332 volumes and covers the history of the Ming dynasty from 1368 to 1644. It ...
'' expounds how the
Hongwu Emperor, founder of the
Ming dynasty
The Ming dynasty (), officially the Great Ming, was an imperial dynasty of China, ruling from 1368 to 1644 following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming dynasty was the last orthodox dynasty of China ruled by the Han peo ...
(1368–1644 AD), sent a merchant of Fulin named "Nieh-ku-lun" () back to his native country with a letter announcing the
founding of the Ming dynasty.
[Grant (2005), p. 99.][Hirth (1885), p. 66.] It is speculated that the merchant was a
former archbishop of
Khanbaliq called Nicolaus de Bentra (who succeeded
John of Montecorvino
John of Montecorvino or Giovanni da Montecorvino in Italian (1247 – 1328) was an Italian Franciscan missionary, traveller and statesman, founder of the earliest Latin Catholic missions in India and China, and archbishop of Peking. He convert ...
for that position).
[Luttwak (2009), p. 170.] The ''History of Ming'' goes on to explain that contacts between China and Fulin ceased after this point and an envoy of the great western sea (the
Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ...
) did not appear in China again until the 16th century AD, with the 1582 AD arrival of the Italian
Jesuit missionary
, image = Ihs-logo.svg
, image_size = 175px
, caption = ChristogramOfficial seal of the Jesuits
, abbreviation = SJ
, nickname = Jesuits
, formation =
, founders = ...
Matteo Ricci in Portuguese
Macau
Macau or Macao (; ; ; ), officially the Macao Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (MSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China in the western Pearl River Delta by the South China Sea. With a p ...
.
[For information on Matteo Ricci and reestablishment of Western contact with China by the ]Portuguese Empire
The Portuguese Empire ( pt, Império Português), also known as the Portuguese Overseas (''Ultramar Português'') or the Portuguese Colonial Empire (''Império Colonial Português''), was composed of the overseas colonies, factories, and the ...
during the Age of Discovery
The Age of Discovery (or the Age of Exploration), also known as the early modern period, was a period largely overlapping with the Age of Sail, approximately from the 15th century to the 17th century in European history, during which seafarin ...
, see: Fontana (2011), pp. 18–35, 116–118.
Trade relations
Roman exports to China
Direct trade links between the Mediterranean lands and India had been established in the late 2nd century BC by the Hellenistic Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt. Greek navigators learned to use the regular pattern of the
monsoon
A monsoon () is traditionally a seasonal reversing wind accompanied by corresponding changes in precipitation but is now used to describe seasonal changes in atmospheric circulation and precipitation associated with annual latitudinal osci ...
winds for their trade voyages in the
Indian Ocean
The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by t ...
. The lively sea trade in Roman times is confirmed by the excavation of large deposits of Roman coins along much of the coast of India. Many trading ports with links to Roman communities have been Indo-Roman trade relations, identified in India and Sri Lanka along the route used by the Roman mission. Archaeological evidence stretching from the Red Sea ports of
Roman Egypt to India suggests that Roman commerce, Roman commercial activity in the Indian Ocean and History of Southeast Asia, Southeast Asia declined heavily with the Antonine Plague of 166 AD, the same year as the first Roman embassy to Han China, where similar plague outbreaks had occurred from 151 AD.
[McLaughlin (2010), p. 58–60.]
High-quality
glass
Glass is a non-crystalline, often transparent, amorphous solid that has widespread practical, technological, and decorative use in, for example, window panes, tableware, and optics. Glass is most often formed by rapid cooling ( quenching ...
from Roman manufacturers in
Alexandria
Alexandria ( or ; ar, ٱلْإِسْكَنْدَرِيَّةُ ; grc-gre, Αλεξάνδρεια, Alexándria) is the second largest city in Egypt, and the largest city on the Mediterranean coast. Founded in by Alexander the Great, Alexandri ...
and Syria was exported to many parts of Asia, including Han China.
The first
Roman glass
Roman glass objects have been recovered across the Roman Empire in domestic, industrial and funerary contexts. Glass was used primarily for the production of vessels, although mosaic tiles and window glass were also produced. Roman glass productio ...
ware discovered in China is a blue soda-lime glass bowl dating to the early 1st century BC and excavated from a Western Han tomb in the southern port city of Guangzhou, which may have come there via the Indian Ocean and
South China Sea
The South China Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean. It is bounded in the north by the shores of South China (hence the name), in the west by the Indochinese Peninsula, in the east by the islands of Taiwan and northwestern Phi ...
.
[An (2002), p. 83.] Other Roman glass items include a mosaic-glass bowl found in a prince's tomb near
Nanjing
Nanjing (; , Mandarin pronunciation: ), alternately romanized as Nanking, is the capital of Jiangsu province of the People's Republic of China. It is a sub-provincial city, a megacity, and the second largest city in the East China region. T ...
dated to 67 AD and a glass bottle with opaque white streaks found in an
Eastern Han
The Han dynasty (, ; ) was an imperial dynasty of China (202 BC – 9 AD, 25–220 AD), established by Liu Bang (Emperor Gao) and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–207 BC) and a warr ...
tomb of
Luoyang
Luoyang is a city located in the confluence area of Luo River and Yellow River in the west of Henan province. Governed as a prefecture-level city, it borders the provincial capital of Zhengzhou to the east, Pingdingshan to the southeast, Nanyang ...
. Roman and Persian glassware has been found in a 5th-century AD tomb of Gyeongju, Korea, capital of ancient Silla, east of China. Roman glass beads have been discovered as far as Japan, within the 5th-century AD Kofun period, Kofun-era Utsukushi burial mound near Kyoto.
From Chinese sources it is known that other Roman luxury items were esteemed by the Chinese. These include gold-embroidered carpet, rugs and gold-coloured cloth,
amber
Amber is fossilized tree resin that has been appreciated for its color and natural beauty since Neolithic times. Much valued from antiquity to the present as a gemstone, amber is made into a variety of decorative objects."Amber" (2004). In ...
,
asbestos cloth, and
sea silk
Sea silk is an extremely fine, rare, and valuable fabric that is made from the long silky filaments or byssus secreted by a gland in the foot of pen shells (in particular '' Pinna nobilis''). The byssus is used by the clam to attach itself to ...
, which was a cloth made from the silk-like hairs of a Mediterranean shellfish, the ''Pinna nobilis''.
[Thorley (1971), pp. 71–80.][Lewis (2007), p. 115.] As well as silver and bronze items found throughout China dated to the 3rd–2nd centuries BC and perhaps originating from the
Seleucid Empire, there is also a Roman gilded silver plate dated to the 2nd–3rd centuries AD and found in Jingyuan County, Gansu, with a raised relief image in the centre depicting the Greco-Roman god Dionysus resting on a feline creature.
A maritime route opened up with the Chinese-controlled port of
Rinan in Jiaozhi (centred in modern Vietnam) and the Khmer people, Khmer kingdom of Funan by the 2nd century AD, if not earlier.
Jiaozhi was proposed by Ferdinand von Richthofen in 1877 to have been the port known to the Greco-Roman geographer
Ptolemy
Claudius Ptolemy (; grc-gre, Πτολεμαῖος, ; la, Claudius Ptolemaeus; AD) was a mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist, who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were of importance ...
as Cattigara, situated near modern Hanoi. Geography (Ptolemy), Ptolemy wrote that Cattigara lay beyond the Golden Chersonese (the
Malay Peninsula) and was visited by a Greek sailor named Alexander, most likely a merchant.
Richthofen's identification of Cattigara as Hanoi was widely accepted until archaeological discoveries at
Óc Eo
Óc Eo ( Vietnamese) is an archaeological site in modern-day Óc Eo commune of Thoại Sơn District in An Giang Province of southern Vietnam. Located in the Mekong Delta, Óc Eo was a busy port of the kingdom of Funan between the 2nd century BC ...
(near Ho Chi Minh City) in the
Mekong Delta during the mid-20th century suggested this may have been its location.
[For a summary of scholarly debate about the possible locations of Cattigara by the end of the 20th century, with proposals ranging from Guangzhou, Hanoi, and the Mekong River Delta of the Kingdom of Funan, see: Suárez (1999), p. 92.] At this place, which was once located along the coastline, Roman coins were among the vestiges of long-distance trade discovered by the French archaeologist Louis Malleret in the 1940s.
[Osborne (2006), pp. 24–25.] These include Roman golden
medal
A medal or medallion is a small portable artistic object, a thin disc, normally of metal, carrying a design, usually on both sides. They typically have a commemorative purpose of some kind, and many are presented as awards. They may be int ...
lions from the reigns of
Antoninus Pius
Antoninus Pius ( Latin: ''Titus Aelius Hadrianus Antoninus Pius''; 19 September 86 – 7 March 161) was Roman emperor from 138 to 161. He was the fourth of the Five Good Emperors from the Nerva–Antonine dynasty.
Born into a senatori ...
and his successor Marcus Aurelius.
[Young (2001), p. 29.] Furthermore, Roman goods and native jewellery imitating
Antonine Roman coins have been found there, and Granville Allen Mawer states that Ptolemy's Cattigara seems to correspond with the latitude of modern Óc Eo.
[Mawer (2013), p. 38.][Mawer also mentions Kauthara (in Khánh Hòa Province, Vietnam) and Kutaradja (Banda Aceh, Indonesia) as other plausible sites for that port. Mawer (2013), p. 38.] In addition, Ancient Roman glass beads and bracelets were also found at the site.
The trade connection from Cattigara extended, via ports on the coasts of India and Sri Lanka, all the way to Roman-controlled ports in Egypt and the Nabataean territories on the north-eastern coast of the Red Sea. The archaeologist Warwick Ball does not consider discoveries such as the Roman and Roman-inspired goods at Óc Eo, a coin of Roman emperor
Maximian found in
Tonkin
Tonkin, also spelled ''Tongkin'', ''Tonquin'' or ''Tongking'', is an exonym referring to the northern region of Vietnam. During the 17th and 18th centuries, this term referred to the domain '' Đàng Ngoài'' under Trịnh lords' control, includ ...
, and a Roman bronze lamp at P'ong Tuk in the Mekong Delta, to be conclusive proof that Romans visited these areas and suggests that the items could have been introduced by Indian merchants.
[Warwick Ball, Ball (2016), p. 153.] While observing that the Romans had a recognised trading port in Southeast Asia, Dougald O'Reilly writes that there is little evidence to suggest Cattigara was Óc Eo. He argues that the Roman items found there only indicate that the Indian Ocean trade network extended to the ancient Kingdom of Funan.
Chinese silk in the Roman Empire
Roman commerce, Chinese trade with the Roman Empire, confirmed by the Ancient Rome, Roman desire for silk, started in the 1st century BC. The Romans knew of wild silk harvested on Kos, Cos (''coa vestis''), but they did not at first make the connection with the silk that was produced in the Pamir Mountains, Pamir Sarikol kingdom. There were few direct trade contacts between Romans and Han Chinese, as the rival Parthians and Kushans were each protecting their lucrative role as trade intermediaries.
During the 1st century BC silk was still a rare commodity in the Roman world; by the 1st century AD this valuable trade item became much more widely available.
[Whitfield (1999), p. 21.] In his ''Natural History (Pliny), Natural History'' (77–79 AD),
Pliny the Elder
Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/2479), called Pliny the Elder (), was a Roman author, naturalist and natural philosopher, and naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and a friend of the emperor Vespasian. He wrote the encyclopedic ' ...
lamented the financial drain of coin from the Roman economy to purchase this expensive luxury. He remarked that Rome's "womankind" and the purchase of luxury goods from India, Arabia, and the Seres of the
Far East
The ''Far East'' was a European term to refer to the geographical regions that includes East and Southeast Asia as well as the Russian Far East to a lesser extent. South Asia is sometimes also included for economic and cultural reasons.
The ter ...
cost the empire roughly 100 million sesterces per year, and claimed that journeys were made to the Seres to acquire silk cloth along with pearl diving in the
Red Sea
The Red Sea ( ar, البحر الأحمر - بحر القلزم, translit=Modern: al-Baḥr al-ʾAḥmar, Medieval: Baḥr al-Qulzum; or ; Coptic: ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϩⲁϩ ''Phiom Enhah'' or ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϣⲁⲣⲓ ''Phiom ǹšari''; ...
.
Despite the claims by Pliny the Elder about the trade imbalance and quantity of Rome's coinage used to purchase silk, Warwick Ball asserts that the Roman purchase of other foreign commodities, particularly spice trade, spices from India, had a much greater impact on the Roman economy.
In 14 AD the Roman Senate, Senate issued an edict prohibiting the wearing of silk by men, but it continued to flow unabated into the Roman world.
Beyond the economic concerns that the import of silk caused a huge outflow of wealth, silk clothes were also considered to be decadent and immoral by Seneca the Elder:
Trade items such as spice and silk had to be paid for with Roman gold coinage. There was some demand in China for Roman glass; the Han Chinese also produced glass in certain locations.
[Ball (2016), pp. 153–154.] Chinese-produced glassware date back to the Western Han era (202 BC – 9 AD). In dealing with foreign states such as the Parthian Empire, the Han Chinese were perhaps more concerned with diplomatically outmaneuvering their chief enemies, the nomadic Xiongnu, than with establishing trade, since mercantile pursuits and the Four occupations, merchant class were frowned upon by the Scholar-official, gentry who Government of the Han dynasty, dominated the Han government.
Roman and Byzantine currency discovered in China
Valerie Hansen wrote in 2012 that no Roman coins from the Roman Republic (509–27 BC) or the Principate (27 BC – 284 AD) era of the
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post- Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediter ...
have been found in China.
[Hansen (2012), p. 97.] Nevertheless,
Warwick Ball
Warwick Ball is an Australia-born Near-Eastern archaeologist.
Ball has been involved in excavations, architectural studies and monumental restorations in Jordan, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Ethiopia and Afghanistan. As a lecturer, he has been involved wit ...
(2016) cites two studies from 1978 summarizing the discovery at
Xi'an
Xi'an ( , ; ; Chinese: ), frequently spelled as Xian and also known by other names, is the capital of Shaanxi Province. A sub-provincial city on the Guanzhong Plain, the city is the third most populous city in Western China, after Chongqi ...
, China (the site of the Han capital
Chang'an
Chang'an (; ) is the traditional name of Xi'an. The site had been settled since Neolithic times, during which the Yangshao culture was established in Banpo, in the city's suburbs. Furthermore, in the northern vicinity of modern Xi'an, Qin S ...
) of a hoard of sixteen Roman coins from the reigns of Tiberius (14–37 AD) to Aurelian (270–275 AD).
[Ball (2016), p. 154.] The Roman coins found at Óc Eo, Vietnam, near Chinese-controlled
Jiaozhou, date to the mid-2nd century AD.
[O'Reilly (2007), p. 97.] A coin of Maximian (r. 286–305 AD) was also discovered in
Tonkin
Tonkin, also spelled ''Tongkin'', ''Tonquin'' or ''Tongking'', is an exonym referring to the northern region of Vietnam. During the 17th and 18th centuries, this term referred to the domain '' Đàng Ngoài'' under Trịnh lords' control, includ ...
.
As a note, Roman coins of the 3rd and 4th centuries AD have been discovered in Japan; they were unearthed from Katsuren Castle (in Uruma, Okinawa), which was built from the 12th to 15th centuries AD.
Shortly after the smuggling of silkworm eggs into the Byzantine Empire from China by Nestorian Christian monks, the 6th-century AD Byzantine historian Menander Protector wrote of how the Sogdians attempted to establish a direct trade of Chinese silk with the
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...
. After forming an alliance with the Sasanian Persian ruler Khosrow I to defeat the Hephthalite Empire, Istämi, the Göktürk ruler of the First Turkic Khaganate, was approached by Sogdian merchants requesting permission to seek an audience with the Sasanian king of kings for the privilege of travelling through Persian territories to trade with the Byzantines.
[Howard (2012), p. 133.] Istämi refused the first request, but when he sanctioned the second one and had the Sogdian embassy sent to the Sasanian king, the latter had the members of the embassy killed by poison.
Maniakh, a Sogdian diplomat, convinced Istämi to send an embassy directly to Byzantium's capital Constantinople, which arrived in 568 AD and offered not only silk as a gift to Byzantine ruler Justin II, but also an alliance against Sasanian Persia. Justin II agreed and sent an embassy under Zemarchus to the Turkic Khaganate, ensuring the direct silk trade desired by the Sogdians.
The small number of Roman coinage, Roman and Byzantine coinage, Byzantine coins found during excavations of Central Asian and Chinese archaeological sites from this era suggests that direct trade with the Sogdians remained limited. This was despite the fact that ancient Romans imported Han Chinese silk, and discoveries in contemporary tombs indicate that the Economy of the Han dynasty, Han-dynasty Chinese imported Roman glassware.
[An (2002), pp. 79–94.]
The earliest gold Solidus (coin), ''solidus'' coins from the Eastern Roman Empire found in China date to the reign of Byzantine emperor Theodosius II (r. 408–450 AD) and altogether only forty-eight of them have been found (compared to 1300 silver coins) in Xinjiang and the rest of China.
The use of silver coins in
Turfan
Turpan (also known as Turfan or Tulufan, , ug, تۇرپان) is a prefecture-level city located in the east of the autonomous region of Xinjiang, China. It has an area of and a population of 632,000 (2015).
Geonyms
The original name of the cit ...
persisted long after the Tang campaign against Karakhoja and Chinese conquest of 640 AD, with a gradual adoption of Ancient Chinese coinage, Chinese bronze coinage during the 7th century AD.
Hansen maintains that these Eastern Roman coins were almost always found with Monetary history of Iran, Sasanian Persian silver coins and Eastern Roman gold coins were used more as ceremonial objects like talismans, confirming the pre-eminence of Greater Iran in Chinese Silk Road commerce of Central Asia compared to Eastern Rome. Walter Scheidel remarks that the Chinese viewed Byzantine coins as pieces of exotic jewellery, preferring to use bronze coinage in the Tang dynasty, Tang and
Song
A song is a musical composition intended to be performed by the human voice. This is often done at distinct and fixed pitches (melodies) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs contain various forms, such as those including the repetit ...
dynasties, as well as Banknote, paper money during the Song and Ming periods, even while silver bullion was plentiful. Ball writes that the scarcity of Roman and Byzantine coins in China, and the greater amounts found in India, suggest that most Chinese silk purchased by the Romans was from maritime India, largely bypassing the overland
Silk Road trade through Iran.
Chinese coins from the
Sui and Tang dynasties (6th–10th centuries AD) have been discovered in India; significantly larger amounts are dated to the Song period (11th–13th centuries AD), particularly in the territories of the contemporary Chola dynasty.
Even with the Byzantine production of silk starting in the 6th century AD, Chinese varieties were still considered to be of higher quality.
This theory is supported by the discovery of a Byzantine ''solidus'' minted during the reign of Justin II found in a Sui-dynasty tomb of Shanxi province in 1953, among other Byzantine coins found at various sites.
[Luttwak (2009), pp. 168–169.] Chinese histories offer descriptions of Roman and Byzantine coins. The ''
Weilüe
The ''Weilüe'' () was a Chinese historical text written by Yu Huan between 239 and 265. Yu Huan was an official in the state of Cao Wei (220–265) during the Three Kingdoms period (220–280). Although not a formal historian, Yu Huan has been h ...
'', ''Book of the Later Han'', ''
Book of Jin
The ''Book of Jin'' is an official Chinese historical text covering the history of the Jin dynasty from 266 to 420. It was compiled in 648 by a number of officials commissioned by the imperial court of the Tang dynasty, with chancellor Fang ...
'', as well as the later ''
Wenxian Tongkao
The ''Wenxian Tongkao'' () or ''Tongkao'' was one of the model works of the '' Tongdian'' compiled by Ma Duanlin in 1317, during the Yuan Dynasty.
References
*Dong, Enlin, et al. (2002). ''Historical Literature and Cultural Studies''. Wuhan: Hube ...
'' noted how ten ancient Roman silver coins were worth one Roman gold coin.
The Roman golden ''aureus'' was worth about twenty-five silver ''denarius, denarii''. During the later Byzantine Empire, twelve silver ''miliaresion'' was equal to one gold ''nomisma''. The ''
History of Song'' notes that the Byzantines made coins of either silver or gold, Ancient Chinese coinage#early round coins, without holes in the middle, with an inscription of the king's name.
It also asserts that the Byzantines forbade the production of counterfeit coins.
Human remains
In 2010, mitochondrial DNA was used to identify that a partial skeleton found in a Roman grave from the 1st or 2nd century AD in Vagnari, Italy, had East Asian ancestry on his mother's side.
A 2016 analysis of archaeological finds from Southwark in London, the site of the ancient Roman city Londinium in Roman Britain, suggests that two or three skeletons from a sample of twenty-two dating to the 2nd to the 4th centuries AD are of Asian ancestry, and possibly of Chinese descent. The assertion is based on forensics and the analysis of skeletal facial features. The discovery has been presented by Dr Rebecca Redfern, curator of human osteology at the Museum of London. No DNA analysis has yet been done, the skull and tooth samples available offer only fragmentary pieces of evidence, and the samples that were used were compared with the morphology of modern populations, not ancient ones.
Hypothetical military contact
The historian Homer H. Dubs speculated in 1941 that Roman prisoners of war who were transferred to the eastern border of the Parthian empire might later have clashed with Han troops there.
After a Roman army under the command of Marcus Licinius Crassus decisively lost the battle of Carrhae in 53 BC, an estimated 10,000 Roman prisoners were dispatched by the Parthians to Margiana to man the frontier. Some time later the nomadic Xiongnu chief Zhizhi established a state further east in the Talas River, Talas valley, near modern-day Taraz. Dubs points to a Chinese account by
Ban Gu of about "a hundred men" under the command of Zhizhi who fought in a so-called "fish-scale formation" to defend Zhizhi's wooden-palisade fortress against Han Dynasty, Han forces, in the Battle of Zhizhi in 36 BC. He claimed that this might have been the Roman testudo formation and that these men, who were captured by the Chinese, founded the Liqian village, village of Liqian (Li-chien, possibly from "legio") in Yongchang County.
There have been attempts to promote the Sino-Roman connection for tourism, but Dubs' synthesis of Roman and Chinese sources has not found acceptance among historians, on the grounds that it is highly speculative and reaches too many conclusions without sufficient hard evidence.
Genealogical DNA test, DNA testing in 2005 confirmed the Proto-Indo-Europeans, Indo-European ancestry of a few inhabitants of modern Liqian; this could be explained by transethnic marriages with Indo-European people known to have lived in Gansu in ancient times,
such as the Yuezhi and Wusun. A much more comprehensive DNA analysis of more than two hundred male residents of the village in 2007 showed close genetic relation to the
Han Chinese
The Han Chinese () or Han people (), are an East Asian ethnic group native to China. They constitute the world's largest ethnic group, making up about 18% of the global population and consisting of various subgroups speaking distinctiv ...
populace and great deviation from the Caucasian race, Western Eurasian gene pool.
The researchers conclude that the people of Liqian are probably of Han Chinese origin.
The area lacks archaeological evidence of a Roman presence.
See also
* China–Greece relations
* China–Italy relations
* China–European Union relations
* Comparative studies of the Roman and Han empires
* ''The Malay Chronicles: Bloodlines, Malay Chronicles: Bloodlines'' and ''Dragon Blade (film), Dragon Blade'', films based on Sino-Roman relations
* Ancient Greece–Ancient India relations
Notes
References
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Further reading
* Leslie, D. D., Gardiner, K. H. J.: "The Roman Empire in Chinese Sources", ''Studi Orientali'', Vol. 15. Rome: Department of Oriental Studies, University of Rome, 1996.
* Schoff, Wilfred H.: "Navigation to the Far East under the Roman Empire", ''Journal of the American Oriental Society'', Vol. 37 (1917), pp. 240–249
*
External links
* Duncan B. Campbell: [https://www.academia.edu/1952695/Romans_in_China Romans in China?]
* :zh:s:新唐書/卷221下, ''New Book of Tang'' passage containing information on Daqin and Fulin (Chinese language source)
* Silk-road.com
The First Contact Between Rome and China
{{Territories with limited Roman Empire occupation & presence
Foreign relations of ancient Rome
Foreign relations of Imperial China
History of foreign trade in China
Ancient international relations