Western Region Travel Series 13: Visiting the Ancient Ruins of Tianshan Mountains

From 1900 to 1901, 1906 to 1908, and 1913 to 1916, Aurel Stein, a British Hungarian, successively went to my country's Xinjiang and Hexi regions to conduct archaeological expeditions and published archaeological reports on these three expeditions: "Ancient Hotan - A Detailed Report on Archaeological Excavations in Xinjiang, China", "Archaeological Map of the Western Regions", and "Archaeological Map of the Heart of Asia". These three works are Stein's masterpieces. They comprehensively describe the ruins and relics of the Han and Tang Dynasties in Xinjiang, my country, as well as the treasures of the Dunhuang Grottoes and the Buddhist art of the Thousand Buddha Caves. They reveal the mystery of the ancient civilization in the region and the exchange and integration of Chinese and Western civilizations. The Travels in the Western Regions series integrates the archaeological data of Stein's three expeditions to western China and integrates and revise the above-mentioned archaeological reports so that the public can more easily understand the process and results. There are 15 volumes in the series. This volume comes from "Archaeology of the Heart of Asia": In October 1914, Stein explored the ruins of the ancient Gaochang Kingdom and excavated the Tuyugou ruins, the Mutougou ruins and the ancient tombs of Astana. The colorful Silk Road culture, especially the Central Plains-style funerary objects, reflects the blood relationship between the vast Tianshan area and the Central Plains civilization since the Han and Tang Dynasties.