For years Chinese garrisons held points in what is now Western Kansu. Modern archeology has shown that the frontier wall built west of Tunhuang toward the close of the second century B.C. was held by Chinese garrisons until the middle of the second century A.D. It was only when the increasing impotence of the Han monarchs made it difficult to maintain order even at home that these were withdrawn.

At Lungmen in northern Honan, where Buddhist sculpture of the T'ang period is found side by side with the earlier work of the Northern Wei, at Tunhuang in western Kansu, where the explorations of Stein and Pelliot have brought to light a wonderful collection of sculpture and painting dating from the eighth, ninth, and tenth centuries, and at various other points in the empire the artists of T'ang China have left behind them convincing evidence of noble religious inspiration coupled with a high degree of technical proficiency.

In 1900, Sir Aurel Stein led his first Central Asian expedition, conducting extensive excavations in the Khotan oasis. This same indefatigable explorer conducted another memorable journey over Central Asia in 1906-09, which ended with his investigation of the Thousand Buddha Caves at Tunhuang. Stein in his last expedition to Innermost Asia, as he titled his report of this mission, conducted further excavations in the Turfan and Loulan area from 1913 to 1915.

The great Chinese Silk Route connected India with central Asia, West Asia, and Europe. This route stretched some 4,350 miles from Loyang on the Yellow river (also known as the Huang He) in China to Ctesiphon on the Tigris river in West Asia. From Loyang it went on to Ch'ang and Tunhuang, near the source of the Yellow river.

One of the earliest surviving papers from Tunhuang that exhibits this dyeing is a 26-feet long roll providing a commentary on the Vimalakīrti Nirdeśa Sūtra.

Tunhuang

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