• Acta Via Serica
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.1-20
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• 2021

The Taq-i Bustan reliefs are representative works from the Sassanian dynasty of the 4th to 7th centuries. This study analyzes the costumes depicted in the Taq-i Bustan reliefs to gain understanding of the phenomena of cultural exchange between the East and West by observing the foreign cultural elements appearing in the Sassanian costumes of that time. Literature study and artifacts analysis were conducted in parallel. External elements appearing in Taq-i Bustan's costume were Greek-Roman and Central Asian. The tunics and trousers of the gods and the trousers of kings (Ardashir II, Shapur II and Shapur III) were made of thin fabric and showed many wrinkles, a characteristic of Greek and Roman clothing. On the spandrel above the arch of the great grotto of Khusrau II are depicted the goddesses of Victory, in a Greco-Bactrian style. Among the costume elements of Taq-i Bustan, there were also Central Asian elements observed. One Central Asian costume element was the round clasp ornament for tying the trousers. The side slits and hem of the tunic were presented in the style of the Sogd clothing of Central Asia in the 6th and 7th centuries, while the pearl rounded pattern was activated in Sogd, Kucha and Kizyl in the 7th and 8th centuries. These reliefs are considered important evidence of eastern influences in Sassanian culture.

• Acta Via Serica
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.89-108
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• 2022

Since the most ancient times, lapis lazuli had been used for luxury goods such as jewelry and seals, to embellish sculptures and weapons or the precious objects of tombs, such as the golden mask of Tutankhamon or the famous "Standard" of the royal cemetery of Ur. Much more recent seems to be its frequent use as a pigment in wall paintings or polychrome stucco. In this article, the question of the sources for this extremely rare mineral is briefly discussed and the places proposed by ancient scholars as deposits of the mineral are presented and examined. The information provided in the medieval Arabic and Persian scientific literature has been considered and compared with the data of our modern geological knowledge. A list of sites in Central Asia, the Middle East, and India with lapis lazuli occurrence on wall paintings illustrate its wide use in different artistic cultures and periods between the 2nd and 10th centuries C.E. These cultures are in fact different in ethnic and linguistic origin and in the religious, economic, and social sphere, but closely interconnected by common pan-regional artistic traditions in style, materials, and techniques employed. A case study investigated by the authors in the Friday Mosque of Iṣfahān gives an example of the use of lapis lazuli pigment in Islamic wall paintings and stuccoes.

• Acta Via Serica
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.65-88
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• 2022

With the expansion of the Russian Empire southward in the nineteenth century, connoisseurs, art historians, and scholars in Russia began to pay attention to carpet traditions in the new territories of the Russian Empire in Turkestan. In journals and other specialty publications, they underscored a need to establish claims to authority over the knowledge of the traditional craft. They were highly attuned to parallel accounts of carpet weaving from regions that had a longer history of research and collecting of carpets. In contrast to the situation in Western Europe or the United States, commentators bemoaned the fact that the public and even professed experts in Russia did not properly appreciate carpets from the Caucasus and Central Asia. These scholars articulated a need to establish authority over the carpet weaving traditions of Russia's colonial possessions, resulting in a push toward a serious study of carpet weaving as a legitimate field of inquiry. This paper uses published sources on early carpet scholarship from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries to examine how carpet weaving traditions in Central Asia entered an imperial discourse of knowledge. It argues that attempts to understand and categorize carpet weaving as an art form occurred along two fronts. Intellectuals and scholars attempted to wrest control over the locus of knowledge from experts in the West as well as from local weavers. In the process, they established a distinctly imperial vision of carpet weaving in contrast to competing imperial discourses and over traditional forms of knowledge.

• Acta Via Serica
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.39-64
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• 2022

Ancient Iranians highly esteemed the horse and horse tacks, one of which is the jul (saddlecloth). It is a felt, sheepskin, or woven pad placed between the horse's back and saddle. The aim of this paper is to identify and categorize jul designs in the Sāsānian period. The research questions are about the variety of jul designs and how to categorize them. This is fundamental research and the method is descriptive and analytical. Neither a jul nor a saddle-cover remains from the Sāsānian period, therefore the statistical population includes all available items, such as metal and stone items and parget and plasterworks, in which juls are recognizable. Due to the scarcity of such items, all the available samples were studied; so the sampling method is a total enumeration. This is documentary research by means of note-taking and using reliable websites; the data has been analyzed qualitatively. The results show that jul designs were not diverse in the Sāsānian period. All-over designs were dominant. In terms of pattern types, these designs are classified into five groups, each of which has its own formal and aesthetic characteristics: all-over design with a four-petal flower pattern, allover design with a checkered pattern, all-over design with a spotted pattern, allover design with a tiger stripe pattern, and all-over design with a zigzag pattern.

• Acta Via Serica
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.1-38
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• 2022

Many knotted carpets from western China and Central Asia from 700 BCE to 700 CE demonstrate strong resemblances to the Assyrian-Persian stone reliefs and Hellenistic-Romanmosaics. Egypt reveals the earliest samples in plain linen fiber and carpets with colorful designs in the mural paintings. The Egyptian wall decoration in faience shows the motifs of waterlily in two variations in the design, both of which appear in the Assyrian floor thresholds designs. The same waterlily or four-petal design in the Egyptian and Assyrian stonework also appear in the Pazyryk knotted carpet in the same manner. The Assyrian thresholds show a composition with a central area and borders in a square or rectangular overall design, which again parallels the Pazyryk carpet. The ideas of composition and motifs commonly seen in the Hellenistic and Roman mosaics appear in the carpets of Central Asia and western China. The similarities between the stone mosaic works and carpets demonstrate clearly that the remote places and peoples in ancient times learned from, and exchanged with, each other the ideas and artistic styles, and integrated to create some local artistic traditions, thanks to the roles the easy-to-carry textiles played throughout the Silk Road. The carpets played their roles: as practical material for daily use, and as carrier of cultural information through their designs.

• Acta Via Serica
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.133-152
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• 2022

Both in popular perception and specialized literature, the Achaemenid Empire, for over two centuries the most important player from the Aegean to the Indus, is rarely evoked in correlation with the complex of socio-cultural dynamics which shaped the spaces of what has become known as the Silk Road(s). Building on the case study of the Pazyryk carpet on the one hand (King 2021, 353-361, Linduff and Rubinson 2021, 88-97), and of the spread of an artistic motive such as the quatrefoil on the other (Kim 2021), this paper explores the rich and complex nature of the commercial networks that flourished across Central Asia under the aegis of Achaemenid Great Kings. Both archaeological and literary evidence shall be discussed (especially the Aramaic Documents from Ancient Bactria: Naveh and Shaked 2012, and now King 2021, 315-320). If taken together and read against the grain, such material is significant for the following reasons. First, it suggests the existence - and the scale - of commercial activities directly fostered or indirectly promoted by the imperial administration in Central Asia, an area of crucial importance within the Achaemenid domains, but for which our evidence is rather scanty and difficult to assess. Second, it shows how the Achaemenid "Imperial Paradigm" (Henkelman 2017) affected the social and economic landscape of Central Asia even after the demise of the Empire itself, thus considerably shaping the world of the Silk Road(s) a century before the Ancient Sogdian Letters (de la Vaissière 2005, 43-70) or Zhāng Quiān's famous report.

• Acta Via Serica
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.87-100
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• 2023

Interaction between sedentary and nomadic cultural traditions has played an important role in the centuries-old history of applied arts in Uzbekistan. By the late 19th and early 20th century, driven by urbanization in the region and the gradual transition of nomadic and semi-nomadic peoples to sedentary lifestyles, many industries and traditional cultural forms of formerly nomadic ethnic groups disappeared. Nevertheless, their role in shaping the national cultural identity of the Uzbek people is great. This is true in relation to one of the largest ethnic groups in Uzbekistan, the Kungrats, whose applied art represents a unique, viable, and yet little-studied phenomenon in the national culture of Uzbekistan. The article reviews carpet weaving, one of their surviving crafts, exemplified by qiz-gilam, a unique type of rug made using a combined technique. This study helps to show the nature of historical and cultural interrelations in the carpet weaving of Central Asian peoples and their cultural contacts with the carpet art of neighboring regions more widely and objectively. An important theoretical result of this study is the creation of criteria and tools for identifying qiz-gilam carpets. This allows us to bring clarity to the yet undeveloped system of their identification in museum and gallery practice.

• Acta Via Serica
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.101-120
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• 2023

In March 1245, Pope Innocent IV authorized three missions to the Mongols, seeking information about this menace from the East and summoning Eastern Christian support against an anticipated Mongol onslaught. Only one of the missions, led by John of Plano Carpini, reached Mongolia-the first-known Western European party to reach East Asia by a land route. Traveling along the Silk Road's new "Grasslands Route," John and his companion Benedict reached the camp of Güyüg Khan, where they witnessed his installation as the Great Khan. Upon their return to the papal court in 1247, they delivered Güyüg's letter demanding the submission of the pope and all the West's princes. John also presented a detailed report on what he and Benedict had learned. A close reading of it reveals a master intelligence operative at work. In addition to presenting an overview of Mongol history and culture, Friar John's report provides detailed information on the Mongols' grand strategy, their military organization and armaments, and their battle tactics. Turning from intelligence gathering to military operations, he offered practical advice on how to meet and defeat the coming Mongol onslaught, an attack that, providentially for the West, never came. What did occur was a modest but significant migration of Western missionaries and merchants to East Asia in the century following this pioneering journey.

• Acta Via Serica
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.1-24
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• 2023

The art of carpet weaving is the most habitual form of traditional art in Azerbaijan, it reflects a rich inner world and occupies a special place in the history of a national culture's development. The Azerbaijani carpet has always stood out for its plots, ornaments, compositions, and high quality and the Azerbaijani people, faithful to their spiritual values, have protected and developed it throughout the centuries. In this article, several Ganja-Gazakh-type carpets from the Azerbaijan National Carpet Museum collection and their artistic and technical characteristics are discussed. Specimens of material, sacred language, and ornamentation are considered. The deepest meaning is embodied in tamga in particular. Tamga is a unique phenomenon serving as an amulet, lineage sign, and self-identification of Turkic peoples. The Gazakh carpets of the Ganja-Gazakh type cover the Gazakh region of Azerbaijan, the Borchali region of Georgia, and the Goycha Lake region of Armenia. Karapapakh Azerbaijani Turks have inhabited these areas since ancient times. Tarakama (nomads) are often equated with the name Karapapakh (black hat). One of the densely populated regions of Tarakama is Gazakh. Gazakh, Garagoyunlu, Salahli, Shikhli, Kamarli, Damirchilar, Gaymagli, Goycali, Daghkasaman, Oysuzlu, Gachagan, and pile carpets with different compositions are woven in the Gazakh carpet weaving center. Large, simple in form, step-shaped or hook-like medallions, horn-shaped patterns, animal images, and stamps with symbols of ancient Turkic tribes characterize the Gazakh carpet weaving group.

• Acta Via Serica
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.155-174
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• 2023

Trade along the Silk Routes reached its zenith during the Pax Mongolica, a period of relative stability in Eurasia that was created by the Mongol empire in the 13th and 14th centuries. It is generally believed that the Silk Routes declined after the disintegration of the Mongol empire in the second half of the 14th century and that they fell into disuse after the 1453 Ottoman conquest of Constantinople as the Europeans sought alternative maritime routes to Asia. This paper examines the aftermath of the Mongol-era overland and maritime Silk Routes from a non-Eurocentric perspective. Seen from the standpoint of various successors to the Mongol empire, such as the Timurid empire, the Mughal empire, the Uzbek khanate, the Ottoman empire, Manchu Qing, and Russia, the overland and maritime Silk Routes did not really collapse or sharply decline during the post-Mongol period. These Mongol successor states maintained close and thriving overland trade relations with each other or some important maritime trade relations with Southeast Asia. It may be argued that the Silk Routes in the post-Mongol world functioned rather independently of European seaborne commerce.