Xinjiang, or the Uighur Autonomous Republic of China, consists of the Tarim Basin, which is mostly desert with a belt of oases in the north and south, and of the valley of the Ili and the region of Dzungaria west of Urumchi and north of the mountain range of Tien Shan. The Dzungarian Gate as well as the Ferghana Gate west of Kashgar were the favourite passages, from time immemorial, for the nomadic incursions from the Siberian and Mongolian plains into the settled areas of Turan and Iran.
The oases of the Tarim Basin form a semicircular belt, the northern part of which consists of Turfan, Karashahr, Kucha, Aksu and Kashgar. The southern belt includes Lou-lan, Miran, Niya, Keriya, Khotan and Yarkend to name just the important ones. It thus stretches north of the Kuen-lun Range all the way from Tun-huang in the east to Kashgar in the west. From Khargalik, near Khotan, a caravan route linked Xinjiang with Ladakh and India.
The Chinese first captured eastern Turkestan from the nomadic Huns in the first century BC, and thus established their control over the Silk Road. In those times most of the country was inhabited by Indo-Europeans of Iranian origin in the south-west (the Asian Scythians, or Saka) and of ‘Tokharian’ origin in the north and north-east (the so-called Yue-che). The Huns pushed these Yue-che westwards and started a big migration movement that finally brought the Saka to southern Afghanistan, to the province of Sistan (Saka-stan) and the Yue-che to Bactria, which in some sources is called Tokharistan. This movement marked the end of the Graeco-Bactrian Empire. Strabo mentions the Tokharoi and the Sakaraulai among the tribes who defeated the Greek king Heliocles between 140 and 130 BC. The Kushan dynasty was probably of Yue-che origin and their empire began as a federation of Yue-che tribes. When this empire reached the peak of its power, it clashed with the Chinese on the western frontier of Xinjiang, at the end of the first century AD. By this time, in the later Han period, the dominance of the Tarim was again disputed between the Chinese and the Huns. The famous general Pan-Chao re-established Chinese control over the area. When some oases like Kucha applied for help to the Kushans, their ethnic relatives, Pan-Chao was able to isolate the Kuchan expeditionary force, which perished in the deserts of Kashgaria. In AD 97, Pan-Chao dispatched a detachment across the Parthian Empire to meet the Romans. The Chinese, frightened by the hostile reception they got from the Parthians, soon decided to return home, but their venture probably gave grounds to the otherwise unconfirmed legend that Pan-Chao’s army pushed as far west as the Aral Sea in pursuit of the Kushans. (Some sources even mention the Caspian Sea.)
Under the Han dynasty, when the Silk Road was firmly in Chinese hands, Buddhist religion, Indian literature and Hellenistic art could take root in the Tarim oases. Indian missionaries followed this route when travelling to China to preach Buddhism. Graeco-Roman art came quite naturally with trade and religion. The southern road was probably used more frequently. Sir Aurel Stein found there, among other things, Roman coins of the Emperor Valens, Graeco-Buddhist bas-reliefs in the purest Gandhara style, Roman caskets, intaglios and Indo-Scythian coins.
The civilisation of Inner Asia at that time may be divided into two distinct longitudinal zones: in the north we encounter the art of the steppe, nomad art par excellence, characterised by bronze buckles and parts of harness in animal style, with purely ornamental tendencies; in the south, along the Silk Road, across the double belt of oases around the Tarim Basin, we find the art of sedentary peoples, paintings and sculptures directly inspired by Greek, Persian and Indian art, which was brought in and united by the Buddhist religion.
South of Tarim there is the same mixture of Persian and Buddhist elements, particularly in the paintings on wooden panels found at Dandan-Uilik, north-east of Khotan. Female nudes reminiscent of Ajanta, horsemen and camel riders entirely Persian in appearance, and a bearded bodhisattva dressed more like a Persian nobleman all indicate both Persian and Buddhist influence. We may therefore conclude that before the conquest of the country by the Turkic tribes in the second half of the eighth century, the Indo-European oases both north and south of the Tarim derived their culture from the great civilisations of India and Persia, and owed nothing, or very little, to the civilisation of the steppes.1 (See also p.171.)
While Kucha was mostly influenced by Persia, Turfan was more exposed to currents from China. Here the Indo-Iranian elements gradually disappeared and merged with the cultural trends of the Tang dynasty. After all, Turfan was ruled by a Chinese dynasty from the beginning of the sixth century, but when the locals rebelled against the suzerainty of the Tang, a Chinese army occupied and annexed the oasis in AD 640. The Tang expansion westwards continued, Karashahr and Kucha were defeated in turn, and the Indo-Iranian civilisation was thus destroyed. Kashgar, Khotan and Yarkend also recognised the supremacy of the Tang, and the whole of Xinjiang was once again under Chinese rule. Karashahr, Kucha, Kashgar and Khotan formed a Chinese defence line called the ‘Four Garrisons’, but after the defeat by the Arabs in 751 the whole of Inner Asia was lost to the empire.2
Turkish domination followed in Xinjiang. The Uighurs, originally a Turkic tribe from western Mongolia, appeared on the scene. They intervened in the Chinese Civil War, helping the Emperor Su-tsong, and were able to carve a vast empire of their own on the western fringes of China proper. Manichaeism, an amalgam of Persian Mazdeism and Nestorian Christianity, became their state religion, no doubt imported from Persia when the followers of this sect were persecuted there by the Arabs. Nestorians came to Xinjiang most probably at the same time, and their colonies were the source of the medieval legends of Prester John.
In the ninth and at the beginning of the tenth century, the Uighurs were squeezed out of Mongolia and came in great numbers to Xinjiang, where they still represent the main element of the population. With a Manichaean religion the Uighurs also took over the Soghdian alphabet, derived from Syriac, and developed it into the famous Uighur script. This replaced the Turkish runic script of the Orkhon and was subsequently used by the Mongols of Chingiz-Khan and by Timur, 500 years later. Gradually, the influence of the Manichaeans and Nestorians faded and the penetration of Islam began. In the twelfth century the population was already predominantly Muslim by religion and Turkic by ethnic origin, and it has remained so up to the present day.
In the eighteenth century, under the Qing dynasty, the Tarim basin became Chinese once more and the penetration of the Han settlers began. This provoked local discontent, which culminated in an uprising in 1864 when Xinjiang Muslims rebelled against the Manchu dynasty. An officer from Kokand, Yakub Beg, came to Kashgar in 1866, and within months became ruler of a state that was duly recognised by Britain, Russia and Turkey. However, in 1877 he was defeated by the Chinese commander and died shortly afrerwards. The centre of his short-lived empire was the oasis of Turfan.
When European explorers and geographers had almost completed the survey of Inner Asia, in the last two decades of the nineteenth century, they heard rumours that somewhere in the deserts of Chinese Turkestan scores of fragmented remains of ancient civilisations had been found preserved, apparently, as well as those in the deserts of Egypt. Following this, numerous archaeological expeditions made for Xinjiang, and in 1907 their efforts were crowned by Sir Aurel Stein’s discovery of the ‘caves of a thousand Buddhas’ near the village of Tun-huang.3
Shortly before and after the First World War, several French, German, Russian, Japanese and, of course, British expeditions worked on the Xinjiang sites, but unfortunately their time ran short. In the early 1920s Xinjiang became a contested area between Russia and China, and the Chinese authorities were extremely reluctant to let foreigners in. After a brief spell of fame, Xinjiang fell again into obscurity.
Nevertheless, since the nineteenth-century Great Game, Britain and Russia were in competition in Xinjiang. Both powers opened consulates in Kashgar and there was also a British representation in Urumchi. The Russians, however, gained an advantage when they extended their railway as far as Andizhan in the Ferghana valley, and even more when, under the Soviets, the Turksib (TurkestanSiberian) line was built, bringing the Russian communication network within easy reach of the Xinjiang border. The trade with India declined sharply and the Russian influence both commercial and strategic, increased. Xinjiang gradually became a virtual Russian protectorate and remained so until the Chinese Communist victory in 1949. This is how Peter Fleming described the situation in the mid–1930s: ‘the only powers in the land are the Russian civil and military advisers. Every department, every regiment, is in effect directed by a Soviet agent occupying a key position; the Province is run from Moscow.’4
When the Communists seized power in China, the Russians had to leave, and Xinjiang became more inaccessible than ever. After the Sino-Soviet split in 1960 thousands of nomads crossed the border into the USSR. After the collapse of the Soviet Union the traffic between Xinjiang, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and also with Russia became much livelier. New communications were opened such as, for example, the rail link between Urumchi and Semipalatinsk, planned since the 1930s, a rail and road link with Almaty in Kazakhstan etc. Tribal, personal and commercial contacts between the Turkic nations were gradually resumed, and these, in turn, provoked anti-Chinese tensions in Xinjiang resulting, from time to time, in armed clashes and riots of which only sporadic news penetrated abroad.
A railway line from Urumchi to Kashgar was opened in spring 1999, and from Kashgar to Khotan in 2011. Bus connections exist between Tunhuang and Miran and, further west, between Kashgar and Yarkend and Khotan.
The bulk of the population are the Turkic-speaking Uighurs who also gave the present name to the country: the Uighur Autonomous Republic of China. However, their numbers are becoming increasingly overshadowed by a massive immigration of the Chinese.
The Chinese live mostly in towns while the countryside is predominantly populated by the Uighurs. The ever-increasing influx of the Chinese has recently led to clashes between them and the Uighurs who, being Muslims, are unhappy seeing their country invaded by non-believers who, in addition, impose on them a fairly harsh Communist regime that is completely alien to the traditional Uighur way of life.
In 1991, the law banning all archaeological cooperation with foreigners has been scrapped. A joint French-Chinese mission has come into being and first explorations of the Xinjiang sites began, bringing to light traces of irrigated agriculture dating from the fifth century BC to the third century AD, as well as the earliest examples of Buddhist art on the Silk Road.
Full details of abbreviations and publications are in the Bibliography
1 Grousset, L’Empire, p.92; Dabbs, History, p.119.
2 Sir Aurel Stein explored the remains of the Chinese limes or border defences in the eastern part of Xinjiang in two expeditions in 1907 and 1916.
3 In one of these caves, walled up for 900 years, Stein found a huge library of scrolls written in a number of languages and scripts, dated from the fifth to the tenth century AD.
4 Fleming, P., News from Tartary, p.258.