Early Chinese Travellers of The Silk Road (Xuan Zang)

The Buddhist monk Xuan Zang is the best loved of all Chinese travelers on the Silk Road. Two accounts of his journey have become Chinese classics _his own historical and geographical Records of the western regions and a humorous 16th ¨Ccentury novel ,journey to west (or Monkey ) by Wu Cheng¡¯en ,which tells how an odd assortment

of companions accompany the monk ,vanquishing monsters and overcoming all obstacles. Foreign travel from China was forbidden when ,in 629,Xun Zang undertook his lone journey on foot and horseback to India .He traveled at night to avoid the sentries in the beacon towers beyond Dunhuang ,almost dies of thirst while lost in the desert near the Hami .and was so lavishly feted by the king of Turpan that he finally resorted to hunger strike for permission to continue his journey .taking the northern Silk Road as far as Kucha, He traveled to Tashkent and Samarkand and then ,more or less in the steps of Alexander the Great ,southwards to Peshawar area of modern Pakistan ,where in the famous Buddhist university Nalanda he studied for several years .

He spent 14 years in India .Nepal and Sri Lanka before returning to China via the southern Silk Road .through Kashgar ,Yarkand and Khotan . by the time he had reached Khotan ,news of his return had reached the emperor ,who had the monk triumphantly escorted all the way to the capital at Chang ¡®an.

Xuan Zang returned in 654 with 22 horses being more than 700 Buddhist works ,as well as relics from the Buddha¡¯s chair and statues of gold ,silver and sandalwood. The Big Goose pagoda in Xin¡¯an was built to house the sutras ,and this is where he worked for the rest of his life ,translating them .He died in 664,and the Tang Emperor Gaozong built the Xingjiao temple outside Xi¡¯an in memory of this great man .