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Review
'Recounted with great skill ... opens a window onto a fascinating world' -- Financial Times 'Highly readable and elegant' -- Times Literary Supplement
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
Book Description
The Silk Road, the great trans-Asian highway linking Imperial Rome to China, reached the height of its importance during the T'ang Dynasty. Along it travelled precious cargoes as well as new ideas, art and knowledge. Its oasis towns blossomed into thriving centres of trade. However, as the Chinese lost control of the region, it began to decline to the point where the towns disappeared beneath desert sands. Local legends grew of buried treasure guarded by demons. This is the story of the intrepid adventurers who, at great personal risk, led long-range archaeological raids to the region in the early years of the 20th century. Profiles of such archaeologists as Sir Aurel Stein, who carried off large quantities of priceless wall paintings, sculptures, silks and early manuscripts, augment a narrative which also traces the fate of the works of art that were removed.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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First Sentence
In Central Asia's back of beyond, where China tests her nuclear weapons and keeps a wary eye on her Russian neighbours, lies a vast ocean of sand in which entire caravans have been known to vanish without trace. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
In Central Asia's back of beyond, where China tests her nuclear weapons and keeps a wary eye on her Russian neighbours, lies a vast ocean of sand in which entire caravans have been known to vanish without trace. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Most helpful customer reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Great Game,
By Gene Jannotta (Harrisburg, PA United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Foreign Devils on Silk Road (Paperback)
Mr. Hopkirk in all of his works is accurate, profound and should be mandatory reading for all Foreign Service personnel. Having done Central Asia, the book was the "bible" in knowing the intimate details needed to not only do business in the post-Soviet era, but just in being able to discuss and move within the people where many thousands could not even bring voice to such concepts in the old days, which today are only "chatted" about in remote areas. Hopkirk rips at the fabric of humanity in what the west thinks is proper and what is reality in an eastern environment with its many passionate, intelligent, warm, and emotionally infectious people. I have read all of Peter's works several times and I continue to do so. You just have to be there to know that Hopkirk hits the nerve. It's just too much!! G. Jannotta
4.0 out of 5 stars
return the plundered art work,
By A Customer
This review is from: Foreign Devils on Silk Road (Paperback)
A fascinating account of the plundering of art objects from the Silk Road. I thoroughly enjoyed reading the fascinating tale of the intrigue and scheming as well as the hazards of the laborious expeditions. However, as another reviewer has written, I think Hopkirk has missed the point in that removing these art objects has saved them for posterity. The stolen artifacts are China's patrimony, much like the Magna Carta for Britain, Russian Icons, Martin Luther's writings for Germany, The Bordeaux tapestry for France and the manuscript of the Genji Monogatari for Japan, they are the essence of a nation' cultural heritage and should not be plundered and stashed away in foreign museums! The time has come for these to be returned to their rightful owners so they can be studied and documented and kept for posterity. I commend the book otherwise.
4.0 out of 5 stars
The era of European domination of people of color is over,
By Adoumri (New York, NY) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Foreign Devils on Silk Road (Paperback)
It's easy to become enraptured by Hopkirk's romantic storytelling, but it's important not to forget that the "discoveries" of Sir Aurel Stein and others is tantamount to the theft of historical and cultural artifacts that do not belong to the European people. Like the plunder of religious objects of the Pacific Northwest Coast Indians and displaying them in museums like the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, European and Euro-American cultures have too long felt entitled to co-opt the "goods" of non-European cultures and do with them what they will. So-called "bartering" and "exchange" were often laced with half-hidden threats and intimidation.The era of European domination is over, and it's time to return to those people what rightly belongs to them.
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