Colors of the Silk Road – Central Asia Resource Page 2018

Deliberately broad “Central Asia” is really the “Inner Asia” that extends from the Caucasus to Mongolia, west to the Tian Sian mountains and in the south to northern edges of Afghanistan and Iran.  Such a large region naturally encompasses a huge variation in geography, from some of the driest desert regions on earth to the most forbidding and beautiful glacier-shrouded peaks.  The sweep of the region’s cultural history is encapsulated in part in the history of the “Silk Road” . . . . not to mention the modern changes and newly defined and named countries brought about by the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991.

The first trade routes that became part of what we know today as “The Silk Road” originated hundreds of years ago in the Fergano Valley.  People, settlements, blossoming fruit orchards, palaces, and caravans all thrived along these ancient roads covering roughly the shape of an oval running 2000 miles east and west and bordered by steppes, forests, mountain ranges, no less than five great deserts, and salty warm “fresh-water” lakes. Oasis cities such as Bukhara, Tashkent, Samarkand, Kashgar, Bactria, and the ancient city of Merv made up the hub for the exchange of spices, textiles, and other goods from all over the continent, but especially the exchange of stories, music, ideas, architecture, religions, and philosophies — the original super information highway!

LINKS

https://www.pinterest.com/wholehat/central-asia/ — just lots visuals – architecture, fabric, people, maps, etc . . . just a place to get started in researching “Central Asia” on your own.

History

https://medium.com/@gocebe/the-persians-lost-home-bc63e907bb2e

Geography

https://mountaineering.asia/top-10-mountain-ranges-of-asia/

Videos

 

Pacific Northwest organizations:

Language


Music

Other Resources:

Great websites featuring cultures and ways of life through traditional handcrafts:

News Articles

Local Resources

Maps

Central Asia

Central Asia, including extension into Persia, Afghanistan and at least a bit of Western China

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Silk Road Map 2

The hub of the Silk Road trade routes