Did Ancient Rome Meet China? - What did they know?

a fantastic video popped up on my YouTube feed recently which narrated an ancient Chinese historian describing the Roman Empire the video by the channel voices of the past is really well made it makes you feel like you're a Chinese emperor hearing about the wonders at the edge of the world for the first time but while I find the sort of unfiltered primary source content really insightful it's definitely missing some historical context you know what's going on right now how much have china and rome interacted what do they know about each other is it even accurate in my video we'll be looking to answer these questions right so let's begin by setting the stage for Roman Chinese interactions here's the short and sweet of it were they aware of each other yes did they have direct contact no at least as far as we can tell but for those looking for more details let's now dive into the history first and foremost we must understand that this was a conversation carried out over really vast distances therefore any exchange would have relied on intermediaries playing a super long game of telephone the indirect relationship between Rome and China primarily took the form of land and sea trade the sort of thing had been going on for a long long time the Persian smack dab in between the two powers made a frequent habit of facilitating east-west trade with their 1,600 mile long royal road dating back to the 5th century BC in addition to this route trade would have also been conducted by way of the Persian Gulf out into the Rhea B&C and Indian Ocean while others like the ancient Egyptians would use the Red Sea to get out there when Alexander the Great conquered the region his armies pushed all the way into India assuring in a new era of east-west mixing the successor kingdoms forming in his wake further expanded upon these new connections the Greek historian Strabo for instance seems to indicate that in the 200s BC the greco-bactrian kingdom extended their empire as far as the series a term used to describe a region to the northwest of modern China however these early trade connections were relatively limited in the sense that though they were extremely active and wide-ranging they never quite extended as far away as China yet this would change in the 100's BC when the ascendant Han Dynasty banded out into Central Asia the new Han initiative would be spearheaded by the envoy Jiang Chen who was dispatched to the borderlands in 138 BC returning a decade later with detailed reports of sophisticated civilizations to the west further missions would be sent and even armies these eventually brought about the establishment of new relationships which fostered new trade routes that would flourish in to the Silk Road across that would flow not just silk but fruits and vegetables livestock grain leather and hides tools religious objects artwork precious stones and metals in addition to things like language culture religious beliefs philosophy and science yeah it's a lot of stuff that's gonna be ramping up yet the true heights of the Silk Road would not never been reached until the Middle Ages at least for now the Han Court wished to strengthen this lucrative burgeoning network and sent yet more expeditions apparently in 100 BC one envoy even made it so far as the fringes of what they call Anxi which is basically the parthian empire here he was greeted with over 20,000 horsemen the meeting apparently went quite well as the exchange benefited both parties and soon some more delegations would be traded between the two at the time the Romans were just now expanding into the western borders of Parthia and thus only heard of whispers of what was happening to the east thus the Chinese similarly would only have gotten a fleeting awareness of the far western power they came to know as da chin or great China within a century though Rome had expanded its sphere of influence significantly bringing it ever so slightly closer to China it's around this time that the historian Flores states that many envoys from across the world approached the Roman Emperor Augustus among them are said to have been the series again that's a name often associated with people in northwestern China however though when we cross-reference this specific omission from the series with Chinese records we don't find any mention of this delegation therefore it's most likely to have merely been a group of private merchants rather than official diplomats consulting Chinese records once again though we do find evidence of the first official mission being this event would take place in 97 AD when an Eastern Han General in the Teheran Basin dispatched envoy gan yang to reach distant Duchin he would not succeed in this effort making it only so far as modern Iran yet the mission was not a complete failure and he returned with lots of new information mostly from Persian sources his account tells of a vast empire with over 400 walled towns and dozens of dependent kingdoms stretching over several thousand Li with postal relays along the way according to the book of the later Han and 160-180 it appears that Rome returned the favor by sending its own embassy the text claims that they came by way of the south however most modern scholars again cast doubt on this being an official delegation which instead would have most likely been merchants thus we get an idea of how murky things are with this subject and how it's hard to say definitively whether the Roman Empire and China really ever met in the century which followed the Han Dynasty would fall into decline and retract its borders until the Empire long United again divided this created a blackout of sorts when it came to communication with Rome as China turned inwards it wouldn't be until the tang dynasty of the 700s that China once again extended its reach far out to the west but by this time the Roman Empire had been reduced to the far smaller Byzantine Empire tang records do tell of several delegations arriving from fool in their name for the Byzantines but alas we were again left in the dark when it comes to Western sources indicating whether these were government officials or private merchants thus as the years go by Roman Chinese relations remain unconfirmed and the window for official interaction simply passes however it did not prevent merchants from bustling back-and-forth with anecdotes or prevent individuals from collecting and synthesizing the information already floating out there this now brings us to the final portion of the video what did they know about each other we'll begin from the Chinese perspective their view is best captured in the brief account of way that is quoted extensively in the video by voices from the past in it the Chinese historian writes about Rome's trade routes territory customs and products I've got an entire video dedicated to discussing the accuracy of the contents in detail so check that out if you're interested but as a recap let's take a look at each of these sections briefly regarding trade routes the historian fairly accurately relays the main routes as being an overland one through Parthia and a sea route through the Indian Ocean leading to Egypt the descriptions are quite vague and present a hazy view of the West for instance the Nile is simply referred to as a river flowing out of the West and the Mediterranean as another great sea some indication is given to the travel distances and duration involved which are roughly on the mark regarding territory the historian says that Rome has numerous minor kings and dependencies with other territories divided into small countries it's accurate in a broad sense with the hint at the Roman provincial system but when the author gets down to naming specific regions it's clear that they are only really ever aware of Rome's Far Eastern holdings regarding customs it's a lot more vague statements like saying the Romans wear western clothes right in western language play drums and wave flags there are some specifics that get interesting like the mention of multi-story buildings and the widespread use of courier stations this is true enough but again it's something that was also widely present in the Roman East and parthia there's no real mention of great engineering feats like the roads aqueducts or more famous buildings such as the Colosseum in terms of Roman government the author talks of a 36 man group of leaders that meets regularly and a king whose reign is not permanent and who can be replaced these references appear to be to the Senate and the consuls but are very outdated for the time and definitely do not come from someone who is up to speed with the management of the Empire at the time regarding products the historian gives us a long list of goods which come from Rome the robustness of the details clearly shows that he spoke to a lot of merchants we hear of coins precious metals clasps fine linen animal products spices and a ton more overall it's quite indicative of the richness of trade however contained in the list are definitely goods traded by Rome but not necessarily produced by Rome for instance the historian makes frequent mention of silk despite that's not being a domestic product for Rome at the time at least not in any significant quantities so overall I'd say it's a quite fuzzy picture of Rome but one which you can kind of discern if you squint just right again I recommend you check out my other video for deeper analysis now let's turn to Rome well if you thought China's information was been here come the Romans hold my beer the main problem is that their ancient sources only really ever speak of the series this is troublesome since the enigmatic name has been loosely used over the years to refer to a variety of people inhabiting roughly Central Asia Pliny the Elder for instance speaks briefly of them in his book the natural history he states that their land lies far beyond the city and grasslands and their vast desert tracts the series are said to be found to the northeast just past a mountain chain they enjoy a temperate climate with some Sunny Hills rivers and forests Amina's Marcellinus says much the same in that their sky is serene the breeze gentle and delicious as for what the people are like Pliny says that though they resemble the savages of the land they're of an inoffensive nature and prefer to trade with those who approach them this passive nature is confirmed by Amiens Marcellinus who also states that there are people who live quietly avoiding all arms and battle apparently they are famous for the wool to be found in their forests which plenty suggest must be thoroughly ransacked to supply the room and women back at home beyond this very little else is stated besides the naming of some of the more distant and fierce tribes such as the kaziri who feed on human flesh the Byzantines several centuries later shed a little more light on the topic but really don't mention anything about culture or government in the same way that the Chinese historians did when it came to Rome so basically all we're left with is this kind of vague mention of this series tribe which in and of itself is not really representative at all of you know mainland China and what was going on there so still you know a lot up in the air that's not to say there weren't traders who knew more I'm sure there were people in the Roman sphere who knew much more it's just that we don't have records and so thus we really don't have much to discuss on this front but it's at least an exercise in looking at what could be seen at the edges of the Roman horizon and in fact ancient authors often acknowledged just how far away things were when it came to this country of silk far far to the east apparently one Christian writer actually quotes some Indian philosophers who state that if a rope were stretched from Rome to China directly it would pass through the centre of the earth I do hope that in the future were able to uncover more about this fascinating relationship between Rome and China but for now this is the extent of our own knowledge about other people's knowledge I hope you enjoyed and definitely recommend you check out voices from the past as well as my own video where we do a deeper dive on the accuracy of the ancient Chinese historians account of Rome anyways thanks to all of our patrons and the many talented researchers writers and artists who made this video possible see in the next one you

Channel: Invicta

Views: 1,223,913

Keywords: rome and china contact, did rome and china know each other, ancient rome and china, did ancient rome, did ancient rome meet china, ancient china, daqin, rome, ancient rome, roman empire, china on rome, yu huan, history, primary source, china, silk road documentary, rome china contact, pliny the elder, seres, rome on china, weilue, scythians, documentary, voices of the past

Id: LGyJXIveQGc

Length: 12min 29sec (749 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 01 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/legitusernameiswear]

Ancient civiliazations and cultures: What did they know? Did they know things?? Let's find out!