Not only silk, but also goods such as spices, glass and porcelain were transported on the Silk Road; religion and culture also spread with the trade. Buddhism, for example, reached China and Japan via the Silk Road and became the predominant religion there. Christianity reached China via the Silk Road. The knowledge of paper and black powder came along the Silk Road to the Arab countries and from there later reached Europe.
Trade goods
Silk was probably the most extraordinary trade good for the West that passed through the Silk Road. After all, this fabric also gave the route its name. Nevertheless, this term distorts the reality of trade, because many other goods were also exchanged via these trade routes. Caravans heading to China carried gold, gems, and especially glass, among other things, which is why researchers have pointed out that from an eastern perspective, the "Silk Road" could just as easily be called the "Glass Road." In the other direction, apart from silk, the main goods carried were furs, ceramics, porcelain, jade, bronze, lacquers and iron. Many of these goods were exchanged en route, changed hands several times and thus gained in value before reaching their final destination.
In addition to silk, spices in particular were important trade goods from Southeast Asia until modern times. They were used not only as seasonings and flavourings, but also as medicines, anaesthetics, aphrodisiacs, perfumes and for "magic potions".
Nevertheless, the most sought-after Chinese product was silk. The development of silk weaving in China can be traced back to the 2nd millennium BC. The production of large quantities for export, accompanied by the formation of silk manufactories, did not take place until the end of the "Time of the Contested Empires" in the 3rd century B.C. The oldest finds of Chinese silk in Europe were made in the Celtic princely tomb at Heuneburg (Sigmaringen district), which dates back to the 6th century B.C..
In the Roman Empire, like purple and glass, it was one of the luxury items. Only the richest could afford modest quantities of the precious material. In the time of the Pax Augusta, when the western end of the Silk Road was also secure, the Roman upper class increasingly demanded eastern silk, spices and jewels. Although the Eastern Romans under Emperor Justinian I finally succeeded in establishing their own silk production in late antiquity with the help of smuggled-in caterpillars, the import of Chinese silk remained very significant.
Organization of the trade
Bandits and robbers were very often a problem of security because of the large flow of goods and riches. The Han Empire therefore equipped its caravans with special escort protection and extended the Great Wall to the west.
The organization of transcontinental trade was complex and difficult. Countless animals, a large number of drovers and tons of trade goods had to be organized and moved. In the process, people and animals had to be cared for on the long journey under difficult geographical and climatic conditions. Usually, however, the merchants did not travel the entire route to sell their goods. Rather, trade took place over various sections of the route and several intermediaries. While the western end of the Silk Road was long controlled by the Parthians and later the Sassanids, in Central Asia it was mainly various groups of equestrian tribes (see for example Xiongnu, Iranian Huns, Kök Turks) that dominated the exchange of goods.
An important role was played by Sogdian traders, whose contacts extended as far as China. Preserved letters of Sogdian traders are also an important source for the history of the Silk Road.
In the Middle Ages, the Jewish Radhanites also used the Silk Road. In addition to oases, the route was also interrupted by military stations such as stopping points for changing horses, which ensured through traffic.
The Bactrian camel, which was native to Central Asia, was of great importance as a means of transport. It has the advantage that it is more heat-resistant than dromedaries and has a winter coat, so that it is well adapted to the extreme temperature fluctuations typical of continental climates in the steppe and mountain regions with large differences in altitude.
Recent research warns that the volume of overland trade and the transport infrastructure of the various trade routes was often overestimated, because the Silk Road was not a single, continuous route from east to west. Transportation often involved the handling of goods at various stations and was time-consuming. Moreover, older research did not sufficiently appreciate the importance of the transfer landscapes, such as Central Asia and Persia.
Culture and technology transfer
The transfer of technical achievements, cultural goods or ideologies was less intentional than the exchange of goods. Long-distance travel of all kinds, whether for commercial, political, or missionary reasons, stimulated cultural exchange between different societies. Songs, stories, religious ideas, philosophical views, and unknown knowledge circulated among travelers. For several centuries, the Silk Road formed the most enduring, far-reaching, and diverse exchange between the Orient and the Occident.
In addition to the introduction of new foods, an agri-cultural exchange also took place.
Important techniques such as papermaking and letterpress printing, chemical processes such as distillation and the production of black powder, as well as more efficient horse harnesses and the stirrup were spread from Asia to the West via the Silk Road.
diffusion of religions
One particularly long-lived commodity that was transported via the Silk Road was religions. Buddhism, for example, came from India to China and Japan via the northern route. Some of the earliest descriptions of the Silk Road come from Chinese pilgrims traveling to the Indian homeland of Buddhism.
Mongols and Turkic peoples originally worshipped the sky god Tengri, in Iran and Parthia Zoroastrianism prevailed, while in Sogdia a separate folk faith was widespread.
Christianity was present early in Asia Minor and Iran. In the 5th century, the East Syrian Church, adhering to Nestorianism, was formed in the Sassanid Empire. At this time Nestorianism was able to spread into the eastern Iranian area as far as Sogdia and Bactria. In the 8th century Samarkand was reached. In the Tarim Basin there was a first missionary wave in the 8th century and a second in the 11th century. In the Transylvanian region, many Nestorian tombstones were erected in the 9th-14th centuries. Even earlier, believers reached the then capital of China, Xi'an, as documented by a stele erected in 781. A Chinese edict of 845 turned against all foreign religions and caused Nestorianism to disappear here by the 10th century. With the Mongol rule it experienced a second heyday and then finally disappeared in China in the 14th century. Among the Turkic peoples, the faith also persisted until the 14th century, when it was eradicated by Timur Lenk, who adhered to Islam.
Manichaeism arose in Mesopotamia from AD 240 and spread rapidly in Persia, where it failed to prevail against Zoroastrianism, and in the lowlands of Turan to the east. He was able to gain believers in Turfan, Merw, and Parthia. In the important trading colonies of the Sogdians, numerous Manichaeans were found alongside Nestorians and Buddhists, as they were in 7th-century China. In 762 the rulers of the Uighur steppe kingdom professed Manichaeism, and in the kingdom of Kocho this religion also held a strong position alongside Buddhism. In Dunhuang the Manichaeans disappeared in the 11th century, and in Turfan not until the Mongol period in the 13th century.
Buddhism developed at the turn of time in the Indo-Iranian border region, in Gandhara and in Kushana, under Hellenistic influence, the formal language with the human Buddha figure. Kanishka I, king of the Kushan Empire, was a promoter of Buddhism in the Middle Silk Road area for political reasons; the religion gained many followers in Sogdia in the 3rd and 4th centuries. Buddhism first reached China at the turn of the twentieth century, strengthened during the Northern Wei dynasty in the 4th and 5th centuries, but it did not have a widespread impact until the 7th century. After the Mongols under Kublai Khan came into increased cultural contact with China in the 13th century, Buddhism also gained adherents. In East and West Turkestan Buddhism dwindled with the advance of Islam, and in the Tarim Basin not until the 15th century. In Dunhuang and China it was unthreatened.
These three religions coexisted more or less peacefully for a long time in many places along the Silk Road. After the death of Muhammad in 632 AD, Islam spread (Islamic expansion) and soon the western part of the Silk Road, and with it trans-Asian trade, was also under Islamic control. After the conquest of the New Persian Sassanid Empire in 642 AD, expansion continued in an easterly direction. Islam spread first to urban centers along the Silk Road and later to rural areas. Islamic communities also emerged in Central Asia and China. Under Timur Lenk, Islam was again spread by force in the 14th century.
disease spread
Just like religious beliefs or cultural goods, diseases and infections repeatedly spread along the Silk Road. Long-distance travellers helped pathogens to spread beyond their area of origin, attacking populations that had neither inherited nor acquired immunity to the diseases they caused. This gave rise to epidemics that could have dramatic consequences.
Probably the best-known and most consequential example in Europe of the spread of diseases along the Silk Road is the spread of the plague in the 14th century. According to a hypothesis by the author William Bernstein, the Pax Mongolica that followed the Mongol invasion in the 13th century again allowed intensified and direct trade contacts between Europe and Asia. This lively exchange also brought plague bacteria, found primarily in wild rodent populations of Asia, to Europe. The plague also reached Central Europe around 1348 via merchant ships from Kaffa on the Crimean peninsula. The transport of furs was particularly conducive to its rapid spread. In this context, it is unclear why the Black Death did not claim a comparable number of lives in China and India. In the similarly densely populated India of the 14th century, there was even a population increase; in the much more densely populated China, more people died from famine and the wars against the Mongols than from the Black Death. There is also no historical record of a pandemic comparable to the Black Death in Europe.
