The Silk Road and
South Asia:
Intersections of
Culture
David M. Kalivas, Ph.D.
What is the Silk Road?
Eurasia
One View: East - West
Another view: All directions
*Silk Road Cultural Complex*
Hittite
Indian
Alexander and Alexandrias
Indo-Greek Kingdoms
2nd to early 1st Century BCE
Periplus of the Erythraean Sea
Who were the Kushans?
Silk Road – Eurasian Highway
Han Dnasty -Xiongnu, Yuezhi
Kushan Empire
1st to 3rd Century CE
Kanishka -Kushan Empire
2nd Century CE
Kushan Coins
Silk Road
Network
----------Gandharan
Style
Buddha
Bodhisattva
Journeys over Silk Routes
Maritime Silk Road
Silk
Decorative
Arts
Jewelry
Commodities
of all kinds
Silk Road Network and the Spread of Hinduism,
Buddhism and Christianity, 200 BCE – 400 CE
7th-16th Centuries
Islamic
Expansion
Delhi Sultanates, 1206 - 1526
Caravansarai:
Nodes of
Exchange
Genghis Khan
Mughal Dynasty 1526 -1725 -1858
Intersection of Cultures: India-Persia-Islam
Red Fort, Delhi
From many intersections
and exchanges to one set of
Eurasian Intersections…
Indian Buddha
Sri Lankan Buddha
Vietnam Buddha
Thai Buddha
Korean Buddha
Chinese Buddha
Tibetan Buddha
Bamiyan – Afghanistan – Ancient Legacy
Ancient Wisdom – Taliban Politics
Cultures continue …
and legacies have a way of carrying on as
borders tend to be porous and not sealed
The Silk Road Network
Asoka the Great
269 – 232 BCE
Ashoka – Interactions with Silk
Road Kingdoms and Cultures
Certainly rulers, their buildings, and
patronage of stupas and monasteries were
important, but it was the hundreds of
anonymous Buddhist Monks and scholars
who traveled back and forth between the
“Holy Land” of India and China that
spread the seeds and set the flowers in
place to bloom…
Three to remember:
Faxian
Xuanzang
Yijing
Faxian (337-422?)
Xuanzang (600-664?)
Xuanzang
Wild Goose Pagoda and Xuanzang
Yijing (635–713)
Silk Road and South Asia: Overland and Sea
Travelers , Merchants, Culture, Language, and
Identity – From Ancient to Modern Times
The India Trade: Pepper, Spices, and Everything Nice…
The Silk Road and Eurasia from the
south, north, east, west:
common threads through time and space