The Silk Route

Words like Samarcanda, Xi’an or Bukhara – together with cinnamon, sandalwood, and lotus flower scents- evoke exoticism and poetry and make us dream of distant landscapes that perhaps, although we love to travel, we will never get to know. These are some of the city names where the Silk Road passed.

In all truth, neither it was the one and only road nor was the silk the only thing transported in that coming and going that got Europe and the Eastern world together since the 2nd century. An extensive network of trade routes with more than 6000 kilometers that crossed Persia, China or India, to ports in what we know today as Turkey and Egypt, was traveled by hundreds of caravans looking for the product exchange. Some journeys could last up to two years, under extreme temperatures (sometimes 50 degrees and others  40 degrees below zero) and subject to thieves harassment but, it was certainly worth it. Objects, jewelry, spices and, of course, news, knowledge and religious beliefs came and went, connecting the world in times where immediate communication and technology were unthinkable. It was, in a way, the beginning of globalization.

Over time, such useful discoveries as gunpowder, the rudiments of printing, paper, and compasses – invented in China – came to Europe and undoubtedly contributed to the development of the West. On the other hand, no less important products such as perfumes, furs, gold, and precious stones, among others, traveled. Buddhism from India passed to China and Japan, as an example of the exchange of thought, but so did epidemics: it is said that the plague that wiped out a third of Europe’s population in the Middle Ages came from Asia.

The Book of Wonders, the story of the best known of travelers, Marco Polo, describes the long and arduous journey of his caravan to bring goods to Kublai Khan, first Emperor of China and last Great Khan of Mongolia.

With the emergence of new sea routes that accelerated delivery times, avoided taxes and thieves along the way, the Silk Road gradually lost the importance it had had for centuries. Today it is used for tourism, although China is working to reopen it with new roads, railways, and ports to revive its trade towards the world.