The Sampul tapestry is an ancient woolen wall-hanging found at the

Tarim Basin The Tarim Basin is an endorheic basin in Northwest China occupying an area of about and one of the largest basins in Northwest China.Chen, Yaning, et al. "Regional climate change and its effects on river runoff in the Tarim Basin, China." Hydr ...

settlement of Sampul in

Lop County Lop, United States National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency County (, Uyghur: ), also Luopu, United States National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (from Mandarin Chinese), is a county in Hotan Prefecture, in the southwest of the Xinjiang Uyghu ...

Hotan Prefecture Hotan PrefectureThe official spelling is "Hotan" according to (also known as Gosthana, Gaustana, Godana, Godaniya, Khotan, Hetian, Hotien) is located in the Tarim Basin region of southwestern Xinjiang, China, bordering the Tibet Autonomous Region ...

Xinjiang Xinjiang, SASM/GNC: ''Xinjang''; zh, c=, p=Xīnjiāng; formerly romanized as Sinkiang (, ), officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China (PRC), located in the northwest ...

, China, close to ancient city of

Khotan Hotan (also known as Gosthana, Gaustana, Godana, Godaniya, Khotan, Hetian, Hotien) is a major oasis town in southwestern Xinjiang, an autonomous region in Western China. The city proper of Hotan broke off from the larger Hotan County to become ...

. The object has many

Hellenistic period In Classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Mediterranean history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the emergence of the Roman Empire, as signified by the Battle of Actium in ...

features, including a

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

centaur and

diadem A diadem is a type of crown, specifically an ornamental headband worn by monarchs and others as a badge of royalty. Overview The word derives from the Greek διάδημα ''diádēma'', "band" or "fillet", from διαδέω ''diadéō'', " ...

, linking it to the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom (formed after the conquest of the Achaemenid Empire by

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon ( grc, Ἀλέξανδρος, Alexandros; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip II to ...

Macedon Macedonia (; grc-gre, Μακεδονία), also called Macedon (), was an Classical antiquity, ancient monarchy, kingdom on the periphery of Archaic Greece, Archaic and Classical Greece, and later the dominant state of Hellenistic Greece. Th ...

and establishment of the Seleucid Empire). It may represent a

Yuezhi The Yuezhi (;) were an ancient people first described in Chinese histories as nomadic pastoralists living in an arid grassland area in the western part of the modern Chinese province of Gansu, during the 1st millennium BC. After a major defeat ...

soldier, in red jacket and trousers, from the 1st century CE. Alternatively, the soldier (king) is possibly a Greco-Bactrian, an Hellenized Saka or a Greco-Saka military aristocrat.

Description

The full tapestry is 48 cm wide and 230 cm long. The centaur fragment is 45 cm by 55 cm, warrior's face fragment is 48 cm by 52 cm.Zhao 2004, p. 194 The recovered tapestry only constitutes the left decorative border of what would be a much bigger wall hanging. Made of wool, it comprises 24 threads of various colours. The

tapestry Tapestry is a form of textile art, traditionally woven by hand on a loom. Tapestry is weft-faced weaving, in which all the warp threads are hidden in the completed work, unlike most woven textiles, where both the warp and the weft threads ma ...

depicts a man with

Caucasoid The Caucasian race (also Caucasoid or Europid, Europoid) is an obsolete racial classification of human beings based on a now-disproven theory of biological race. The ''Caucasian race'' was historically regarded as a biological taxon which, de ...

features, (including blue eyes),Time Life 1993, p. 81 and a centaur. If lost fabric is accounted for, the soldier would be about six times as tall as the centaur. The subject is identified as a warrior by the spear he is holding in his hand as well as a dagger tucked on his waist. He wears a tunic with rosette motifs. His headband could be a

, a symbol of kingship in the Hellenistic world – and represented on

ian and other

ancient Greek coinage The history of ancient Greek coinage can be divided (along with most other Greek art forms) into four periods: the Archaic, the Classical, the Hellenistic and the Roman. The Archaic period extends from the introduction of coinage to the Greek ...

. The centaur is playing a horn while wearing a cape and a hood. Surrounding him is a diamond-shaped floral ornament. Due to heavy looting at the location, the dating of the material is uncertain. It has been assigned dates from the 3rd century BC to the 4th century AD.Hansen 2012, pl. 13 textWood 2002, p. 255

Discovery

The tapestry was excavated in 1983–1984 at an ancient burial ground in Sampul (Shanpula), 30 km east of Hotan (Khotan), in the

. The tapestry was, curiously, fashioned into a pair of man's trousers (all the other trousers found in Sampul had no decoration).

Origin

Male face with a caduceus - Google Art Project

It is uncertain where the tapestry was made, although the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom in Central Asia has been suggested to be a possibility. The technique used for the tapestry, with more than 24 threads of different colours, is a typically western one. The centaur's cape and hood are a central Asian modification of the Greek motif. The fact that he plays a horn also distinguishes him from the Greek prototypes. Flower diamond motif on the warrior's

lapel Lapels ( ) are the folded flaps of cloth on the front of a jacket or coat (clothing), coat below the collar and are most commonly found on formal clothing and suit (clothes), suit jackets. Usually they are formed by folding over the front edges o ...

are of central Asian origin. Certain motifs, particularly the animal head on the soldier's dagger, suggest that the tapestry originated in the kingdom of

Parthia Parthia ( peo, 𐎱𐎼𐎰𐎺 ''Parθava''; xpr, 𐭐𐭓𐭕𐭅 ''Parθaw''; pal, 𐭯𐭫𐭮𐭥𐭡𐭥 ''Pahlaw'') is a historical region located in northeastern Greater Iran. It was conquered and subjugated by the empire of the Med ...

in northern Iran.Hansen 2012, p. 202

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

has also been proposed as a possible source. Another suggestion is that it is locally made as Tang annal '' New Book of Tang'' mentioned that local people of Khotan were good at textile and tapestry work when Emperor Wu of Han (r. 141-87 BC) opened the Silk Road to Khotan during the first century BC. The tapestry may have been made roughly a century before 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 ...

conquest Conquest is the act of military subjugation of an enemy by force of arms. Military history provides many examples of conquest: the Roman conquest of Britain, the Mauryan conquest of Afghanistan and of vast areas of the Indian subcontinent, t ...

of the

under Wudi. Hellenistic tapestries have also been found in

Loulan Loulan, also called Krorän or Kroraina ( zh, s=, t=, p=Lóulán <

Eastern Han Chinese

''lo-lɑn'' <

Aurel Stein Sir Marc Aurel Stein, ( hu, Stein Márk Aurél; 26 November 1862 – 26 October 1943) was a Hungarian-born British archaeologist, primarily known for his explorations and archaeological discoveries in Central Asia. He was also a professor at ...

, indicating a cultural link between Loulan and Khotan.

Significance

The existence of this tapestry tends to suggest that contacts between the Hellenistic kingdoms of Central Asia and the

, at the edge of the Chinese world, occurred from around the 3rd century BC.

Exhibition history

The tapestry is on permanent display in the Xinjiang Museum,

Ürümqi Ürümqi ( ; also spelled Ürümchi or without umlauts), formerly known as Dihua (also spelled Tihwa), is the capital of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in the far northwest of the People's Republic of China. Ürümqi developed its ...

, China. Centaur and head fragments of the tapestry have been a part of a major exhibition ''China: Dawn of a Golden Age, 200–750 AD'', held at the

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

, New York, from 12 October 2004 to 23 January 2005. From 18 February to 5 June 2011, they were displayed at the

Penn Museum The University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology—commonly known as the Penn Museum—is an archaeology and anthropology museum at the University of Pennsylvania. It is located on Penn's campus in the University City neighb ...

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...

, in exhibition ''Secrets of the Silk Road''.
Secrets of the Silk Road
' at the

Notes

References

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{{tapestry Silk Road Tapestries Military art Archaeological artifacts of China History of Xinjiang Tourist attractions in Xinjiang Culture in Xinjiang Hellenistic art Ancient Central Asian art 1983 archaeological discoveries