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28 April 2006

Tea Horse Road, Yunnan/Sichuan/Tibet

http://en.chinabroadcast.cn/725/2006/02/19/168@52713.htm

This [...] ancient route spans a not unimpressive 2,350 kilometers, [...]

[T]he Chamadao, literally translated as 'Tea Horse Road' or 'Tea Horse Path', was a central trade route for exchanging Tibetan horses and Chinese tea. The corridor came to play a crucial role in the communication and exchange between the cultures of present-day Yunnan, Sichuan and Tibet

Tibetan trade routes
See also a large scale map



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Porter Route: Tianquan to Kangding, Sichuan/Tibet

http://www.tibet.ca/en/wtnarchive/2003/6/14_7.html
Blazing the tea-horse trail
XIONG LEI, China Daily 06/13/2003

[...]
Few people driving along the paved highway from Ya'an in southwestern Sichuan to Tibet notice a dirt road that forks off near a bridge 4 kilometres from the county seat of Tianquan.
[...]
the dirt road leads to a secluded village called Ganxipo, or Sweet Brook Slope. While today's travellers overlook Ganxipo, many in the past used the village as a stopover on the ancient tea-horse trade route. Heavily ladened porters used to trek
[...]
to and from Kangding in Tibetan inhabited areas. They climbed over the towering Erlang Mountains, gateway to Garze, now a Tibet autonomous prefecture in western Sichuan.
[...]
Li Zhongquan, 81, says he started to carry loads to and from Kangding when he was a teenager.
[...]
"It was 180 kilometres one way from Tianquan to Kangding," Li says. "An able-bodied porter would carry 10 to 12 packs of tea, with each weighing 6 to 9 kilograms. Then you'd carry 7 to 8 kilograms of your own grain and five or six pairs of homemade straw sandals to change on the way. The strongest could carry 15 packs of tea, with a total load of 150 kilograms." The grain lasted no longer than half the journey, says the veteran porter.
[...]
On their way back, the porters would carry medicinal herbs, musk, wool, horn or other special products from Tibet. For such a trip, Li recalls, a porter was paid one silver dollar or 10 kilograms of rice for every pack of tea carried.
[...]
There are over 30 stopovers along the porter route throughout Tianquan County [...]


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Horses, Silver, and Cowries: Yunnan in Global Perspective

http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/jwh/15.3/yang.html

Bin Yang, "Horses, Silver, and Cowries: Yunnan in Global Perspective," Journal of World History September 2004
http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/jwh/15.3/yang.html

... This paper aims to demonstrate the global significance of Yunnan and to redraw the map of early Eurasian communication. While utilizing Chinese scholarship, I supplement Chinese scholars with non-Chinese sources to construct a more comprehensive picture of the Southwest Silk Road that in turn will add a new dimension to the Sino-foreign exchange and Eurasian communication. First, I will present a concise description of the road. Then, focusing on commercial items such as horses, silver, and cowries, I attempt to demonstrate the global importance of Yunnan by illustrating how Yunnan had shaped neighboring societies. Finally, the use of a world-system perspective will contribute to the ongoing world-system debates and add a new dimension to our understanding of Eurasian communications. ...

Yunnan trade routes
Map 2. The Southwest Silk Road in the Nanzhao-Dali Period (7th–mid 13th Century AD).



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24 April 2006

Scott Levi, H-WORLD, on Overland Trade Early-Modern Times

http://h-net.msu.edu/cgi-bin/logbrowse.pl?trx=vx&list=h-world&month=0507&week=b&msg=cQx8VCopwDr3o5mgKTPzVQ&user=&pw=

Early modern overland Eurasian trade is an important issue that is quite frequently, and quite incorrectly, assumed to have fallen into decline with the rise of the European Companies I'm therefore pleased to contribute to this important thread by adding a few observations to R. J. Barendse's very well informed reply (http://h-net.msu.edu/cgi-bin/logbrowse.pl?trx=vx&list=h-world&month=0507&week=b&msg=Sr%2bBd%2buAL3ptIQm08jkzxQ&user=&pw=) to Jonathan Even-Zohar's inquiry
[...]

I'll recommend the account of the earlier English entrepreneur Anthony Jenkinson. Motivated by the rise of the Estado da India to find an alternate route to the Indian Ocean, in the mid-sixteenth century Jenkinson traveled through Russia southward to Bukhara and Persia. The volume cited here also includes a couple of other interesting accounts from the same period.

Jenkinson, Anthony. Early Voyages and Travels to Russia and PersiaS Edited by E. Delmar Morgan and C. H. Coote. Hakluyt Society Publications. 2 vols. 1st ser., nos 72-73. London, 1886.

If Jenkinson is of interest, then you might also take a look at: Willan, T. S. The Early History of the Russia Company, 1553-1603. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1956.

Barendse has given references to a number of excellent sources that will provide a good introduction to Russia's 'Asia trade.' Here's just a few more that should not be overlooked:

Baikova, N. B. Rol' Srednei Azii v russko-indiiskikh torgovikh sviaziakh. Tashkent: Nauka, 1964.

Nizamutdinov, Il'ias. Iz istorii Sredneaziatsko-indiiskikh otnoshenii, (IX-XVIII vv.). Tashkent: Fan, 1969.

Shkunov, V. N. 'Russko-indiiskaia torgovlia na Sredneaziatskikh rinkakh v kontse XVIII-nachale XIX v. (po materialam Rossiyskikh arkhivov).' Vostok, Afro-aziatskie obshchestva: istoriya i sovremennost' 3 (1997), pp. 94-101.

Burton, Audrey. The Bukharans: a Dynastic, Diplomatic and Commercial History, 1550-1702. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997. This impressively detailed study has much to say about Bukhara's commercial relationship with Russia during the seventeenth century, although, as the title suggests, it is from the Bukharan perspective.

[... additional bibliographal listings follow ...]



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05 April 2006

Old World Trade Routes (OWTRAD) Project

http://www.ciolek.com/owtrad.html
05 Apr 2006

Asia Pacific Research Online, Canberra, Australia

Self-description: "This site [est 7 Jul 1999 - ed.] supports online research in the field of dromography [= the study of history, geography and logistics of communication and trade routes - ed.] and provides a public-access electronic archive of geo/chrono-referenced data on land, river and maritime trade routes of Eurasia and Africa during the period 10,000 BCE - circa 1820 CE."

Site contents:
* Introduction; * Reference Tools; * Data sets [in early Apr 2006 there were 58 GIS-ready datasets including] * Africa trade and pilgrimage routes data sets [...] * Asia & the Middle East data sets (# Karakoram and Pamir,1900 CE, major travel routes [17 data points; Src: Walker 1995; georeferenced] # NW China, 100 CE-1400 CE, 'Silk Road' trade routes [45 data points; Src: Anonymous-4 1991; georeferenced] # Tibet, Sichuan and Yunnan, 680 CE-1950 CE - dataset 1, 'Tea and Horse' routes [16 data points; Src: Yang Fuquan 2004a; georeferenced] # Tibet, Sichuan and Yunnan, 680 CE-1950 CE - dataset 2, 'Tea and Horse' routes [18 data points; Src: Yang Fuquan 2004b; georeferenced] # Tibet, Sichuan and Yunnan, 680 CE-1950 CE - dataset 3, 'Tea and Horse' routes [27 data points; Src: Beijing Portal 2004; georeferenced] # China, 1368 CE-1644 CE, Imperial courier (I-chan) routes [458 routes' segments; Src: Hoshi 1971 and Elvin 1982; georeferenced] # NW China,1920 CE, major roads and caravan routes [111 data points; Src: Cable and French 1947; georeferenced] # Tibet, 1900-1950 CE, trade and transportation routes - dataset 1 [150 data points; Src: Baumann 1988; georeferenced] # Tibet, 1900-1950 CE, trade and transportation routes - dataset 2 [14 data points; Src: Norbu & Turnbull 1976, Gyatso 1992, Norbu 1997; georeferenced] # Hellenistic countries, 350 BCE, trade routes [52 data points; Src: Scarre (ed.) 1988; georeferenced] # Middle East, 600-500 BCE, trade routes [13 data points; Src: Cohen and Yisrael 1995; georeferenced] # India,1550-1710 CE, major roads [88 data points; Src: Farooque 1977; georeferenced] # Persia, 550 BCE-450 BCE, major roads [18 data points; Src: Lockhart 1966; georeferenced] # Persia, 50 BCE-300 CE, trade routes [92 data points; Src: Davies 1959; georeferenced] # Kyrgyzstan, 100 BCE-1400 CE - dataset 1, 'Silk Road' routes [37 data points; Src: Artrek n.d.; georeferenced] # Kyrgyzstan, 100 BCE-1400 CE - dataset 2, 'Silk Road' routes [16 data points; Src: Unusaliev and Tabaldiev 1998; georeferenced] # Kyrgyzstan, 100 BCE-1400 CE - dataset 3, 'Silk Road' routes [42 data points; Src: Artrek 2001; georeferenced] # Kyrgyzstan, 100 BCE-1400 CE - dataset 4, 'Silk Road' routes [32 data points; Src: ITMC Tien Shan n.d.; georeferenced] # Kyrgyzstan, 100 BCE-1400 CE - dataset 5, 'Silk Road' routes [57 data points; Src: Kolobova n.d.; georeferenced] # Cambodia [Khmer], 1200 CE, major roads [35 data points; Src: Hatano 2002; georeferenced] # Tajikistan, 400 CE-800 CE - dataset 1, 'Silk Road' routes [104 data points; Src: Tajikistan Development Gateway Team. n.d. (1) & (2); georeferenced] # Tajikistan, 400 CE-800 CE - dataset 2, 'Silk Road' routes [53 data points; Src: Jonboboev & Mamadambarova. n.d. (1); georeferenced] # Anatolia, 1200 CE-1400 CE, trade routes [191 routes' segments; Src: Anonymous-5. n.d; georeferenced] # The Middle East, the Caucasus, Central Asia and China, 1200 CE-1400 CE, trade routes [121 routes' segments; Src: Anonymous-6. n.d; georeferenced] # Turkey, 1300 CE-1600 CE, trade routes [174 routes' segments; Src: Inalcik 2000; georeferenced] # Iran and China, 200 BCE-500 CE, 'Silk Road' routes [27 data points; Src: Klimkeit 1988; georeferenced] # The Mediterranean, Iran and China, 200 BCE-1400 CE, 'Silk Road' routes [55 data points; Src: Klimkeit 1988; georeferenced] # Central Asia, 700-1000 CE, 'Silk Road' routes [59 data points; Src: Whitfield 1999; georeferenced] # Central Asia, 1 CE-1400 CE, 'Silk Road' routes [45 data points; Src: Foltz 1999; georeferenced] # Central Asia, 1 CE-1400 CE, 'Silk Road' routes [40 data points; Src: Anonymous-4 1991; georeferenced] # Middle East and India,1300 CE-1600 CE, trade and pilgrimage routes [149 data points; Src: Michell 1978; georeferenced]); * Europe trade and pilgrimage routes data sets [...]); * The OWTRAD Gazetteer (A list of online Lat/Long Gazetteers, Georeferenced Nodes - coordinates and other details of 12,500 variant names for 3,130 unique places in Eurasia and Africa]; * Catalogue of Georeferenced Caravanserais/Khans [Details of 607 caravanserais/khans and other built facilities (bedestans/qaysariyyas, bridges, forts, lighthouses/beacons, markets/bazaars, hospices, etc.) supporting long-distance communication routes]; * Trade-Routes--at--mm.isu.edu scholarly forum [Historical Transport/Communication/Pilgrimage Networks forum] * The OWTRAD Notation System (Introduction, Details of the formal language); * Trade Routes Resources Blog; * Useful Bibliographies.

URL
http://www.ciolek.com/owtrad.html

Internet Archive
http://web.archive.org/web/*/www.ciolek.com/owtrad.html

Link reported by:
T. Matthew Ciolek (tmciolek--at--coombs.anu.edu.au)

* Resource type [news - documents - study - corporate info. - online guide]:
Study
* Publisher [academic - business - govt. - library/museum - NGO - other]:
Other
* Scholarly usefulness [essential - v.useful - useful - interesting - marginal]:
rating not available
* External links to the resource [over 3,000 - under 3,000 - under 1,000 - under 300
- under 100 - under 30]: under 3,000 (in fact, 1350)


Please note that the above details were correct on the day this post was published. To suggest an update, please email the site's editor at tmciolek@ciolek.com