Paper long abstract:

This talk explores a single-chamber, brick structure, ten-meters-square in base dimensions, thirteen meters in height, and covered by a dome, that stands on the grasslands about 7.5 meters southeast of the center of the town of Guyuan. The building is known by the names Shuzhuanglou (Comb and Make-up Tower) and Xiliangge (West Cool Pavilion). The first name is a reference to the fact that it was part of the appanage of Empress Dowager Chengtian (932–1009) of the Liao dynasty. The reason for the second name is unknown.

Excavation beneath the building in 2000 revealed three wooden coffins, one containing a male and the other females, clothing, and other artifacts including glazed ceramic tiles. The burial goods point to a Chinese tomb occupant, but the structure, all brick and of the dome-on-square style used for mausoleums in Samarkand and western Xinjiang from the tenth through fourteenth centuries, argues that this is the tomb of a Muslim. A Muslim grandson of Khubilai Khaghan has been proposed as the interred.

In recent years, inscribed bricks with the name Kuolijisi have been found at the site. Depending on whether one interprets the four characters as Giwargis or Korguz, the name would be Syriac for at least two different people, one of whom is Christian.. This paper examines all proposed possibilities for the occupant of the Guyuan tomb, as well as the current Chinese understanding of the site. but argues that the strongest evidence is that the Guyuan tomb belongs to a man who converted to Islam, and that its location was a key factor in the construction of the Yuan central capital between 1308 and 1311.

Paper long abstract:

This paper discusses the cross-cultural interactions between various Central Asian populations and members of the Hephthalite and Sogdian elite. The main corpus of evidence for their economic exchanges comes from clusters of coins found in Mongolian and Chinese tomb inventories dated to the early medieval period. Starting from ten Sasanian coins of the Bayannuur tomb found in Mongolia, it will examine various Sasanian coins found in China and Central Asia to determine the manufacture as well as the provenance and circulation of a Sasanian coin. As the coins of the Hephthalite and the Western Turks were manufactured after the Sasanian model, it will also discuss the possible connection among the Sasanians, the Hephthalites, and the Sogdians along the Oasis Road and the Steppe Road.

Paper long abstract:

The Golden Horde was the northwestern expanse of the Mongol empire. Situated at several major axes of the so-called Silk Routes, the entity was home not only to Mongol conquerers but also to nomadic Türks and ethnically-diverse sedentary peoples and alliances, including Mordvins, Bashkirs, Ossets, Cherkes, and others. The steppe constituted the Golden Horde's geographical core, which was surrounded by several sedentary states. Precisely at the heart of the Cuman steppe the Golden Horde's khans started building cities to facilitate expanding and alternative commercial routes and thus help the state finances which were entirely dependent on slave and fur trade. As a result of the unique demographic, nomadic elites began to settle into these newly-built steppe cities. The urban spaces also became centers of higher religious learning during the islamicization of the Horde under the policies enacted by Uzbek khan.

The following paper argues that despite the noticeable shift toward sedentization and türkicization, nomadism, or at least elements of the nomadic economic and cultural model, remained prevalent amongst the Golden Horde's elite until its demise in the early 16th century. Residential remains and newly-unearthed wealth deposits from the Golden Horde's Kuban region and the expanse along the northern Black Sea demonstrate this continued attachment to a centuries-old nomadic cultural tradition and aesthetic. While modern discourse generally argues in favor of a dramatic and complete shift to monumentality, I show that while the Mongol and Türkic elites might have embraced city grandeur out of economic expediency, they used nomadic art, such as animal style, to market themselves as heirs to the Iron-Age steppe warriors. A continued attachment to portable luxury and zoomorphic visuality was a political strategy meant to project the image of a fearsome steppe warrior to outsiders but also consolidate the "nomadic" elite core even as actual pastoral nomadism was waning. Finally, the vigorous circulation of steppe-inspired artistic forms became even more pronounced after the Black Death started to ravage the newly-built steppe cities, necessitating various smaller hordes to migrate further west and bring with them tokens of nomadic elitism.

Paper long abstract:

Saspotse is a small hamlet situated in a side valley of the Indus River in Ladakh, a region that once found itself in the fortunate position of being in the center of the trans-Himalayan network of trade and communication between Northwest India, Kashmir, Tibet, and Central Asia. The 12th century stupa temples at Sapotse stand out as the smallest and newest discovered monuments among the Alchi Group of Buddhist monasteries, which are fundamental to understanding the history and cultural heritage of Ladakh and even of the Western Himalayas as a whole. Although Saspotse has remained little studied due to the state of the damaged murals, the surviving archaeological, architectural, and art historical evidence at the site contains specific data which merit a close investigation that cannot be performed on any other monument.

In particular, Stupa Temple 1 provides unparalleled insight into the intellectual approach of Buddhist masters toward the conception of the “ideal space”: they expressed their philosophy by turning the embellished space into a functional device leading toward enlightenment. This goal was achieved by designing the temple according to an overall spatial concept, i.e., deriving the temple geometry from mandalas, and placing a delicate lion-throne votive stupa in the center of the chamber. The gilded high-relief images and the murals on the votive stupa place the Buddhist teacher (guru) in the position of a Buddha, a feature that reflected a new development in Buddhism in the region. While previous scholars have considered it as a development deriving from Central Tibetan models, this study presents the figure in the center as an Indian siddha (Ch. xituo 悉陀, Tantric master) instead of a Tibetan lama. The configuration of the reliefs will allow us to address the fundamental question of what visual and spatial elements designate “the position of the Buddha” in pictorial representations.

The iconography and the form of the Saspotse votive stupas not only point at a close relation to Kashmir but further prompt us to draw connections to the Buddhist monuments of the Silk Road sites north of the Karakorum and into the Taklamakan Desert - thereby putting the Alchi Group in a broader context than have been done by previous discussions.

Paper long abstract:

Buried in the sand of Lop Nur, a mural tomb dated to the fourth to the fifth century CE in Loulan, Xinjiang barely drew any attention among international scholars since its discovery two decades ago. This tomb, despite the robbery, preserves magnificent traces showing the cosmopolitan taste of elites in Loulan. Before being devoured by the expanding Lop Desert, Loulan was an important hub along the Silk Road, connecting China, Central Asia, and the Steppes. The tomb located northeast of a fortified town served as a nexus of merging diverse cultural traditions and showcased the strategy of appropriating the Other’s visual vocabularies by local elites.

In this paper, I first articulate the tomb designer’s refined understanding of the Han Chinese’s notion of the afterlife through an investigation into the tomb structure and the coffin decoration, both of which derived from the Han dynasty. Then, this article probes into the pictorial program of mural paintings to reveal how the lifestyle of Western Asian and nomadic aristocrats was likely adopted by the Loulan elites. The depiction of banqueting and camel fights demonstrates a keen interest in incorporating noble pastime activities in tomb decoration to maintain status in the afterlife. Lastly, I turn to the religious aspect of this funerary monument. While the tomb’s double chambers and a long tunnel shares structural commonality with contemporaneous tombs in China, a circular pillar decorated with numerous wheels finds few parallels with Chinese burials. I argue that the presence of a central pillar covered by the wheel motif, signifying the Dharma Law, transforms the tomb’s rear chamber into a Buddhist sanctuary. The architectural implication of a Buddhist temple together with the mural painting showing a donor worshipping the Buddha provides critical evidence to understand the transmission of Buddhism at Loulan and the religious faith of the tomb occupants.