The

oasis In ecology, an oasis (; : oases ) is a fertile area of a desert or semi-desert environmentUighur: Qarqan, also spelled Charchan) is the capital of

Qiemo County Qiemo County ( zh, c= ) as the official romanized name, also transliterated from Uyghur as Qarqan County ( Uyghur: ; zh, c=恰尔羌县), is a county under the administration of the Bayin'gholin Mongol Autonomous Prefecture in the Xinjiang Uygh ...

Bayingolin Mongol Autonomous Prefecture Bayingolin Mongol Autonomous Prefecture is an autonomous prefecture in the southeastern Xinjiang, China. It borders Gansu to the east, Qinghai to the southeast and the Tibet Autonomous Region to the south. It is the largest prefecture-level div ...

Xinjiang Xinjiang,; , SASM/GNC romanization, SASM/GNC: Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Sinkiang, officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is an Autonomous regions of China, autonomous region of the China, People' ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

. It is on the Qiemo River and at the foot of the Qilian Mountains, on the Southern Silk Route. In ancient times, the town and the kingdom it controlled were jointly known as

Shanshan Shanshan (; ) was a kingdom located at the north-eastern end of the Taklamakan Desert near the great, but now mostly dry, salt lake known as Lop Nur. The kingdom was originally an independent city-state, known in local Gandhari documents as '' ...

History

Settlement in the Qiemo area dates back to the

Bronze Age The Bronze Age () was a historical period characterised principally by the use of bronze tools and the development of complex urban societies, as well as the adoption of writing in some areas. The Bronze Age is the middle principal period of ...

. The town is located along the ancient Jade Road that traded with the earliest Chinese dynasties, and Bronze Age rock carvings were found south of town along another ancient trade route to what is now Tibet.

Mummies A mummy is a dead human or an animal whose soft tissues and Organ (biology), organs have been preserved by either intentional or accidental exposure to Chemical substance, chemicals, extreme cold, very low humidity, or lack of air, so that the ...

dated to 1,000 BCE were discovered at the Zaghunluq site less than six km southwest of the city center. A particularly well-preserved one is known as the

Cherchen Man Cherchen Man or Chärchän Man or Ur-David is the modern name given to a mummy found in the town Cherchen, located in current Xinjiang region of China. The mummy is a member of the group known as Tarim mummies. His naturally-Mummy, mummified remai ...

. Qiemo existed as an independent kingdom during the Former Han dynasty (123 BCE to 23 CE). It was described in the

Hanshu The ''Book of Han'' is a history of China finished in 111 CE, covering the Western, or Former Han dynasty from the first emperor in 206 BCE to the fall of Wang Mang in 23 CE. The work was composed by Ban Gu (32–92 CE), ...

, chapter 96A thus: Although the town is described in documents from the 1st century BCE to the 9th century CE, the ancient site has not yet been discovered, even though four major expeditions have searched for it. The area was ruled as the kingdom of Calmadana during the earliest heyday of the

Silk Road The Silk Road was a network of Asian trade routes active from the second century BCE until the mid-15th century. Spanning over , it played a central role in facilitating economic, cultural, political, and religious interactions between the ...

. Its fortunes have since ebbed and flowed, mainly with the popularity of the southern trade route. The Chinese Buddhist monk

Faxian Faxian (337–), formerly romanization of Chinese, romanized as Fa-hien and Fa-hsien, was a Han Chinese, Chinese Chinese Buddhism, Buddhist bhikkhu, monk and translator who traveled on foot from Eastern Jin dynasty, Jin China to medieval India t ...

left a brief account of the country after his visit c. 399 CE, recording that there were probably more than 4,000 monks in the country, all

Hinayana Hīnayāna is a Sanskrit term that was at one time applied collectively to the '' Śrāvakayāna'' and '' Pratyekabuddhayāna'' paths of Buddhism. This term appeared around the first or second century. The Hīnayāna is considered as the prelim ...

. Song Yun passed through around 519, and wrote that the country had just been defeated by the

Tuyuhun Tuyuhun (; LHC: *''tʰɑʔ-jok-guən''; Wade-Giles: ''T'u-yühun''), also known as Henan () and Azha (; ), was a dynastic monarchy established by the nomadic peoples related to the Xianbei in the Qilian Mountains and upper Yellow River valley, ...

. It was sometimes abandoned, as when Buddhist monk

Xuanzang Xuanzang (; ; 6 April 6025 February 664), born Chen Hui or Chen Yi (), also known by his Sanskrit Dharma name Mokṣadeva, was a 7th-century Chinese Bhikkhu, Buddhist monk, scholar, traveller, and translator. He is known for the epoch-making ...

passed through in the year 644, and when

Marco Polo Marco Polo (; ; ; 8 January 1324) was a Republic of Venice, Venetian merchant, explorer and writer who travelled through Asia along the Silk Road between 1271 and 1295. His travels are recorded in ''The Travels of Marco Polo'' (also known a ...

came by in 1273. In 2018, Jiayuan was newly listed as a

residential community A residential community is a community, usually a small town or city, that is composed mostly of residents, as opposed to commercial businesses and/or industrial facilities, all three of which are considered to be the three main types o ...

Geography

Qiemo was strategically located at the junction of the main route from

Dunhuang Dunhuang () is a county-level city in northwestern Gansu Province, Western China. According to the 2010 Chinese census, the city has a population of 186,027, though 2019 estimates put the city's population at about 191,800. Sachu (Dunhuang) was ...

Khotan Hotan (also known by #Etymology, other names) is a major oasis town in southwestern Xinjiang, an Autonomous regions of China, autonomous region in Northwestern China. The city proper of Hotan broke off from the larger Hotan County to become an ...

via Jingjue and the mountain route to

Xining Xining is the Capital (political), capital and most populous city of Qinghai province in western China and the largest city on the Tibetan Plateau. As of the 2020 census, it had 2,467,965 inhabitants (2,208,708 as of 2010), of whom 1,954,795 l ...

via

Qinghai Lake Qinghai Lake is the list of lakes by area, largest lakes of China, lake in China. Located in an endorheic basin in Qinghai Province, to which it gave its name, Qinghai Lake is classified as an alkaline lake, alkaline saline lake, salt lake. The ...

.Hill (2009), note 1.13, pp. 83–85. Qiemo is 315 km east of Minfeng, 605 km east of

Hotan Hotan (also known by other names) is a major oasis town in southwestern Xinjiang, an autonomous region in Northwestern China. The city proper of Hotan broke off from the larger Hotan County to become an administrative area in its own right i ...

, and 351 km west of Charklik/

Ruoqiang Town Ruoqiang Town zh, c= , p=Ruòqiāng; Uyghur: Чакилик: Qakilik or Charklik (ancient settlement), Charklik is a town (China), town in Ruoqiang County, Bayin'gholin Mongol Autonomous Prefecture in southeastern Xinjiang, People's Republic of ...

along Highway 315.A Tourism Guide to Cherchen / Qiemo, Xinjiang, China
Centralasiatraveler.com. Retrieved on 2011-03-12.

Administrative divisions

The town is made up of six residential communities and one

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

: Residential Communities (''

Mandarin Chinese Mandarin ( ; zh, s=, t=, p=Guānhuà, l=Mandarin (bureaucrat), officials' speech) is the largest branch of the Sinitic languages. Mandarin varieties are spoken by 70 percent of all Chinese speakers over a large geographical area that stretch ...

Hanyu Pinyin Hanyu Pinyin, or simply pinyin, officially the Chinese Phonetic Alphabet, is the most common romanization system for Standard Chinese. ''Hanyu'' () literally means ' Han language'—that is, the Chinese language—while ''pinyin'' literally ...

-derived names''): * Quegelimaya (), Gulukawuruke (, formerly Gulekeruike ()), Jiahabage (), Ketaimai (, formerly Ketaiman ()), Dianshi Xincun (Dianshixincun; ), Jiayuan () Village: * Caidui ()

Transportation

* Qiemo is well-serviced with buses from the modern bus station just south of the city center, with routes west to

, east to Ruoqiang and north to

Korla Korla,The official spelling according to also known as Kurla, United States National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency or Kuerle, is the second largest city by population in Xinjiang, China. It is a county-level city and the seat of Bayingolin Mo ...

. * Qiemo Airport is located 13 km northeast of the city center.

China Southern Airlines China Southern Airlines (branded as China Southern) is a major airline in China, headquartered in Guangzhou, Guangdong. It is one of the three major airlines in the country, along with Air China and China Eastern Airlines. Established on 1 ...

operates flights, usually twice per week, to and from Urumqi via

. * Qiemo railway station serves on the Hotan–Ruoqiang railway.

References

External links

* Tourism Guide to Cherchen / Qiem
A Tourism Guide to Cherchen / Qiemo, Xinjiang, China
Centralasiatraveler.com. Retrieved on 2011-03-12. {{Authority control County seats in Xinjiang Qiemo County Populated places along the Silk Road