In the contemporary society with convenient transportation, it is common for people to go abroad and travel, work, study and visit all over the world. However, in ancient times, when transportation was backward, it was extremely difficult for Chinese people to go abroad, except for special envoys of the imperial court, military conscripts or religious seekers, ordinary people rarely went abroad.
Speaking of chinese travelers in the middle ages, people will think of Zhang Qian, Faxian, Xuanzang, Wang Xuance and other familiar names, in fact, in addition to them, there are two people who have gone out of the country and interpreted their own unique lives.
During the reign of Emperor Ming of the Eastern Han Dynasty, in order to strengthen his control over the countries of the Western Regions, Liu Zhuang sent the general Dou Gu to lead an army to expel the Xiongnu forces in the Western Regions. In order to restore ties with the countries of the Western Regions, Dou Gu sent 36 officials led by Marquis Ban Chao of Dingyuan to the Western Regions, so that the countries of the Western Regions were subordinated to the Han Dynasty and protected the smooth flow of the Silk Road. After that, Ban Chao was appointed as the Protector of the Western Regions.
In order to establish contact with the then Great Qin State (Roman Empire), Ban Chao sent an emissary Gan Ying to visit Great Qin in the ninth year of Emperor Yongyuan (97 AD). Gan Ying and his party set out from Guizi (Qiuchi, present-day Kucha, Xinjiang) and passed through Central Asia into the Sabbath (Persian Parthian Empire). Soon they came to the coast of the Western Sea (present-day Persian Gulf) on the western boundary of the Sabbath and asked the Parthians for a way to travel west. The Parthian Empire was a transit point for the silk trade in the East and west at that time, and the silk business was monopolized by it, and they were able to make huge profits from the trade every year. They considered that if the Han Dynasty established trade relations with the Roman Empire, it would threaten its monopoly position. The Parthians and Romans were often at war, fearing that an alliance between the two empires would put them strategically passive.
Therefore, they did not provide Gan Ying and his party with a convenient overland route up the two rivers from Syria to Rome. And let them take the difficult sea route. He also said: "The sea is vast, and those who come and go will be given a degree in March when there is a good wind, and if there is a late wind, there will also be two-year-olds, so everyone who enters the sea will receive three-year-old grain." According to the story of the Siren banshee who confused sailors with song in Greek mythology, he said: "The good in the sea makes people think of the earth, and there are many dead." Born inland, Gan Ying knew little about navigation, believed the Patian lies, stopped in the Persian Gulf, abandoned his westward plan, and led the mission back east.
Although Gan Ying and his party failed to reach Rome, and the two major civilizations of the Han Dynasty and Rome lost an opportunity for direct exchanges, Gan Ying was the first person in Chinese history to reach the Persian Gulf, and his westward journey strengthened mutual understanding between China and Central Asia, Persia and other countries, and wrote an important page in the history of cultural exchanges between China and the West.
In 751, the Tang dynasty and the Arab Abbasid dynasty fought a major battle in Tyros (near present-day Jambul, Kazakhstan) for hegemony in Central Asia. The battle ended in the defeat of the Tang army. More than 10,000 soldiers were captured and taken to Aguro (present-day Nankufa, Baghdad, Iraq). Du Huan, the scribe of the Tang army, came to the Arab Empire as one of the captives and began his legendary travel career.
Du Huan traveled and lived in the Arab Empire such as Central Asia, West Asia and even North Africa for more than a decade, and was the first person in Chinese history to visit Morocco. In the big cities of the Abbasid dynasty at that time, he not only found that there were already silk machines from China, but also witnessed some Chinese craftsmen (goldsmiths, painters and textile technicians) working in the local area, such as Fan Shu and Liu Zhu of the Jingzhao people as "Han craftsmen and painters", and Le Ling and Lü Li from Hedong as "weavers".
His islam of arab faith records that "at five o'clock a day, he fasts on meat, and kills for merit." ...... There was also an auditorium, which accommodated tens of thousands of people, and every seven days, the king went out to pray and said to the people, saying: "Life is very difficult, the way of heaven is not easy, adultery is not robbery, detailed rumors, self-endangerment, deceitful and cruel, there is one here, and the sin is great." Whoever fights and is killed by the enemy will ascend to heaven. Kill his enemies and be blessed with immeasurable blessings' "His great eaters of the Fa are judged by their disciples' relatives, even if they are slightly transgressive, they will not be tired of each other." He does not eat meat such as pigs, dogs, donkeys, horses, etc., does not worship the respect of the king's parents, does not believe in ghosts and gods, and worships the heavens (Allah Allah). ”
The prosperous Arab economy also impressed Du Huan, "Within the Guoguo, in the Lilu, the land is born, and there is nothing." Square spokes, abundant goods, brocade pearl shells, full of markets, camels, horses, donkeys and mules, filled the streets and alleys. "Glass vessels, yushi bottle bowls, lids cannot be counted." The white noodles of the stem are not different from Chinese. He once visited the Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantine Empire), according to his record: "The kingdom of Fu ling is in the west of the kingdom of Meng, thousands of miles away from the mountains, also known as the Great Qin." Its color is red and white, the men are dressed in plain clothes, and the women are dressed in pearl brocade. ...... The royal city is eighty miles on all sides, and the land on all four sides is tens of miles. There are about a million victorious soldiers, and they are often at odds with the great food. "Its Great Qin Good Doctor's Eyes and Diarrhea, or Prescient Disease, or Open Brain Hemorrhage." In 762, Du Huan ended his travel career and returned to China with a merchant ship landing in Guangzhou.
After Du Huan returned to China, he recorded his experiences and observations during his captivity and compiled it into the "Record of The Classics". The book recounts the economic and cultural exchanges between China and foreign countries in the middle of the 8th century and the situation of countries in West asia and Central Asia. The states recorded are the Kingdom of Bakhana (present-day Fergana, Uzbekistan), the State of Kang (present-day Samarkand, Uzbekistan), the State of Shizi (present-day Sri Lanka), the Kingdom of Fuling (byzantine Empire), the Kingdom of Mohammad (present-day Unknown), the Broken Leaf (southwest of tookmark in Kyrgyzstan), the State of Shi (near Tashkent, Uzbekistan), the State of Dashi, the State of Chulu (present-day Mali, Turkmenistan), and the State of Toma (present-day Syria), including present-day Central Asia and all parts of West Asia.
His account of Islam and Arab sentiments is concise and correct. The original book of the "Book of Jingxing" is Jiu you, but the Tang Dynasty historian Du You's "General Code" volume 193 "Border Defense Code" excerpts a few paragraphs, Du You said in this part of the "General Preface to Xi Rong": "The clan zihuan accompanied zhenxi jiedu to make Gao Xianzhi's western expedition, Tianbao ten years to the West Sea, Bao Yingchu, because Jia Shang ships returned from Guangzhou, wrote the "Jingxing Record". After the Song Dynasty, the "Taiping Royal Records", "Taiping Huanyu Records", "Tongzhi", "Literature Tongkao" and other books have been quoted. Although the book is incomplete, it has extremely high historical value for the study of the history of foreign relations of the Tang Dynasty, the history of Islam, and the history of the ancient countries of Central Asia.
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Author: Gulang Hermit Editor: Eat Hard Disk Bar, Little Two
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