100 Greatest "China's Firsts" in Xinjiang

Author: Ba Yin
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-05-01
Features: The ancient city of Loulan is located in the Lop Nur Yadan desert in Ruqiang County, Bayingolin Mongol Autonomous Prefecture. It sits atop a high platform, which has helped it survive to this day. This Silk Road city is roughly square, with walls made of rammed earth, covering a total area of over 100,000 square meters. It consists of an administrative district, a Buddhist temple district, and residential areas. Countless circular and rectangular building materials are scattered throughout the city. The main remaining structures are a three-room clay structure covering 106.25 square meters and a 10-4-meter-high mud-brick pagoda. The pagoda was a sacred relic deeply cherished by the ancient Loulan people, while the three-room structure was the only surviving archive building in the grand courtyard of the Western Regions Commandery. In 1900-1901, it became famous worldwide after being discovered by the Chinese guide Aurel Stein and the Swede Sven Hedin. Subsequently, foreigners such as the British Stein and the Japanese Jujiro looted vast amounts of valuable artifacts from the city. Since then, Loulan culture has scattered across the world. Today, the "Li Bo Documents" preserved at Ryukoku University in Japan are among the finest Loulan artifacts that once brought Jujiro into prominence. In the early 20th century and from 1979 onwards, Chinese scientists such as Huang Wenbi, Chen Zongqi, Meng Fanren, Lin Meicun, Wang Binghua, Xia Xuncheng, Mu Shunying, Hou Can, and Idilis Abudureisu successively traveled to Loulan for research, unearthed important artifacts, and published numerous books on Loulan, ending the embarrassing state of Loulan studies abroad. The ancient city of Loulan was first built during the Qin and Han dynasties. The Book of Han records in the "Transmission of the Western Regions": "The country of Shanshan, originally named Loulan, had its capital at the city of Jianmi. It had 1,750 households, 14,100 people, and 2,912 men of fighting age." It also states: "In the fourth year of Yuanfeng (77 BC), the country was renamed Shanshan." Loulan was one of the thirty-six states in the Western Regions and an important city of both the original Loulan and the renamed Shanshan. It was also the seat of the Western Regions Commandery during the Wei, Jin, and early Liang periods. In 1988, the State Council designated it as a key national cultural relic protection unit. The ancient city of Loulan is also known as "Haitou." The ancient Lop Nur was called "Puchanghai," and the city was named after its proximity to the "sea." The city is located near Dunhuang, Yumen Pass, and Yangguan in eastern Gansu, serving as the eastern gateway for the Han Dynasty's expansion into the Western Regions and a military stronghold controlling the Tarim Basin. As a vital stop on the ancient Silk Road, a trading hub for goods between the East and West, and a central city for cultural exchange between China and the West, it held a high international trade status at the time. Two thousand years ago, the Loulan region, though featuring the White Dragon Dunes (now known as Yadan), was rich in grasslands, dotted with oases, and had the main water resources and fishing grounds of the Konkang River and the Lop Nur Lake. Unfortunately, by the 4th century AD, due to natural and human factors, the ecological environment deteriorated, oases disappeared, people fled their homeland, and the city gradually fell into desolation. The renamed Shanshan also collapsed into ruin and dispersal by the 5th century. During the Tang Dynasty, when the monk Xuanzang returned from India after his pilgrimage, he passed through Loulan, where the city walls still stood but the population had vanished. He personally witnessed the desolate ruins and slowly journeyed eastward. The footsteps of Zhang Qian, the Han Dynasty envoy, were the earliest to tread upon Loulan's land. Generals such as Fu Jiezi, Zheng Ji, Ban Chao, Ban Yong, and Li Bo all passed through Loulan, either suppressing rebellions, establishing garrisons, or guarding the region to contribute to the unification of the Western Regions. The Tang Dynasty poet Wang Changling never visited Loulan but, well-versed in the Transmission of the Western Regions in the Book of Han, composed the immortal verse, "I shall not return until Loulan is broken," cementing Loulan's name in Tang history as a symbol of the distant frontier in his poetry.