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Dunhuang - Episode 18038
146 Plays6 years ago
The ancient Chinese city of Dunhuang, located at a strategic crossroads of the ancient southern silk road, is famed for its art and archaeology relating to historical Buddhist worship.
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Transcript
Introduction to Dunhuang
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Speaker
You're listening to the Archaeology Podcast Network. The ancient Chinese city of Dunhuang, located at a strategic crossroads of the ancient southern Silk Road, is famed for its art and archaeology relating to historical Buddhist worship. This is episode 38 for February 7, 2018. I'm Chris Webster, and welcome to the Art 365 podcast, 2018 edition. Art 365 is a podcast today, every day, in 2018.
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Speaker
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Art 365 Podcast & Network Benefits
00:00:34
Speaker
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00:00:54
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Once again, go to arcpodnet.com slash members to support the network and get some great extras and swag in the process. That's arcpodnet.com slash members. This episode was written by Christopher Booth.
Historical Significance of Dunhuang
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Speaker
Dunhuang is a county-level city in the northwestern Gansu Province of Western China, located at an oasis at the edge of the Gobi Desert. The city commanded an important strategic position at the crossroads of the ancient southern Silk Road,
00:01:22
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main road from India to Mongolia and Siberia, and the Hexi Corridor, a travel route to the ancient Chinese capital of Chang'an, now called Chiang. In 121 BCE, the area was subsumed into the Han Dynasty by Emperor Wu, and Dunhuang was established as one of the four frontier garrison towns. The empire built fortifications and sent settlers out to this relatively remote place. The name Dunhuang means Blazing Beacon,
00:01:46
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and probably referred to the beacon fires lit to warn of attacks by nomadic tribes that also lived in the region. As a frontier town, Dunhuang was not only host to a multitude of different peoples through trade, but was also occupied at various times by many different non-Han groups, including local nomadic tribes, the Tibetans, the Wihirs, and the Mongols, who sacked and destroyed the town in 1227.
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Dunhuang went into decline after the Silk Road was abandoned during the Ming Dynasty, but the city was retaken by China in 1715 during the Qing Dynasty. Located in such an economically and militarily important position, the town had grown to an estimated population of more than 76,000 as early as the second century CE and was a key supply stop for trading
Buddhism and the Magao Caves
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caravans. Some of this trading traffic brought Buddhism to China as early as the first century CE and a significant Buddhist community was established in the city.
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The first Buddhist cave temples near the city were carved in 353, 25 kilometers southeast of the city. Originally used for meditation, these 492 temples, called the Magao Caves, or the Caves of a Thousand Buddhas, developed into a major site of worship and pilgrimage. The subject of a 2016 exhibition at the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles, which highlighted the partnership between the Getty Conservation Institute and the Dunhuang Academy to stabilize and preserve these paintings well into the future,
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The Magogratos are the site of the largest collection of Buddhist art in the world, spanning 1000 years. Dating from the 5th to the 14th century, the murals are extensive, covering a total area of 490,000 square feet. The most fully painted caves have paintings all over the walls and ceilings, with geometrical or plant decoration filling the spaces not taken by figurative images. The extensive sculpture at the site is also painted brightly.
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As a largely unbroken chronology of Buddhist art covering 1000 years and what was the crossroads of ancient Asia, the importance of the site cannot be overstated.
Art and Cultural Evolution
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The site provides unparalleled insight into changing influences in art, religion, and even ethnicity in the region of Dunhuang. The earlier murals show a strong Indian and Central Asian influence in the painting techniques, composition, and style.
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These influences can also be seen in the clothing that is depicted. By the time of the Northern Wei Dynasty, 5th and 6th century CE, however, a distinct style of the site had become apparent, combining motifs from China, Central Asia, and India, often within a single cave. The most common motif in the caves is areas covered in rows of small-seated Buddhas produced using a stencil. This is what gave the name the Thousand Buddha Caves to the complex.
The Library Cave's Global Impact
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The cave paintings usually depict Jataka tales, which are stories of the life of Buddha or of Vadana,
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which are parables explaining the doctrine of karma. One of the caves, known as the Library Cave, which had been walled up in the 11th century, not only also contained exceptional art, but a cache of historical documents spanning the first six centuries of the existence of the temples. The contents of the library were unfortunately distributed across the world with major collections now held in Beijing, London, Paris, and
Scholarly Work and Listener Engagement
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Berlin. The International Dunhuang Project was founded in 1994 to coordinate and collect scholarly work on the Dunhuang manuscripts.
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is hard to do justice to this amazing site in an audio-only medium, so please see the show notes for links to the recent Getty exhibition, which featured reconstructions of some of the cave temples, and the International Dunhuang Project. Thank you.
00:04:59
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Thanks for listening to Arc 365. If you want to hear more Arc 365, check out www.arcpodnet.com slash Arc 365 for the 2017 and 2018 episodes. Check out arcpodnet.com slash Arc 365 dash G30 for the last 30 episodes. Please subscribe and rate on your service of choice. We're available on iTunes, Stitcher, and Google Play, among others. Support the APN at arcpodnet.com slash members. Thanks for listening and thanks for being awesome.
00:05:29
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This show is produced and recorded by the Archaeology Podcast Network, Chris Webster and Tristan Boyle, in Reno, Nevada at the Reno Collective. This has been a presentation of the Archaeology Podcast Network. Visit us on the web for show notes and other podcasts at www.archpodnet.com. Contact us at chrisatarchaeologypodcastnetwork.com.