This course will take us on a journey in the footsteps of the merchants who travelled the Silk Road, studying some of the sites they would have seen in the first millenium when mercantile activity was at its height.

We will start with an introduction to the Silk Road, explaining the various routes, the travellers and the items that were carried and traded. We will then follow the routes eastwards, beginning in the Near East with sites including Palmyra and Dura Europos. The art and architecture of the Parthian and Sassanid empires including the architecture at Hatra and the petroglyphs at Naqsh-e Rustam,will follow and then an examination of how the advent of Islam in the 600s impacted sites along the Silk Road.

The kingdom of Sogdiana in central Asia including Afrasiab (ancient Samarkand), will be discussed in our fourth session. Sites in north western China including the famous caves at Dunhuang will feature in the penultimate session. We will conclude our course by studying Chinese art and architecture of the first millennium and consider how its influence was felt in the West.