IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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| IIIF Color HighRes |
| Southern Tibet : vol.7 |
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Citation Information
i~~
THE KWEN-LUN SYSTEM.
375
WEGENER'S map, Pl. LXVIII, was already drawn, though not yet published, when
the existence of his hypothetical range seemed to be proved by the expedition of BONVALOT. The Dupleix Range, discovered by him at about 9o° East. long. and about 1° north of the Tang-la was running E. S. E.—W. N. W. and was believed to be the western continuation of the latter. The high snow-range discovered N. E. of Ladak, at 35° North. lat. and 83° East. long. by BOWER and THOROLD, indicated the prolongation of the range far to the west. »Somit ist die Existenz des gewaltigen, im wesentlichen gradlinigen Kwen-lun-Zuges vom Pamir-Gebirge bis jedenfalls zum 92sten Meridian wohl als sicher anzusehen. Dieser Kettenzug ist zugleich der höchste and imposanteste des ganzen Systems.» Everything seemed indeed to be in favour
of the correctness of this theory. Later exploration has, however, proved that it was wrong inasmuch as the Dupleix and Tang-la Mountains belonged not to the Kwenlun, but to the Kara-korum System.
We now come to Dr. KARL FUTTERER who, in i 896, wrote a summary of the geology of Central Asia and China which was to be regarded as a preparation for his own journey together with Dr. HOLDERER through the Asiatic continent from west to east. He does not feel convinced that the Gaurisankar (1. e. Mt. Everest) and the gigantic peaks of the Kara-korum are the highest mountains of the earth. The absolute culminating peaks may be sought for in the region where the northern parts of the Farther Indian mountain systems come in contact with the old Kwenlun Ranges.'
He shows how SUESS has brought the great Asiatic System of folds in connection with the European mountain chains, and RICHTHOFEN has explained the relation between the geological structure and the physical as well as biological phenomena. Pamir is the nucleus in this world of mountains. Here the European systems of folds meet the Asiatic systems. Between the upper Jehlam and the latitude of Kashgar the systems of Himalaya, Kara-korum and Western Kwen-lun form a »Scharung» with the ranges from the west, i. e. the Hindu-kush and the Iranian folds, following along the Persian Gulf, and, after a great curve, the course of the Indus. They join in the great highlands uninterrupted by meridional depressions or any other orographical irregularities. According to SUESS the Western Kwen-lun, which continues in a N. W. direction in the Kizil-yart, is a part of the Himalayan region of folds which in a broad zone extends far beyond the Kara-korum. So far as the geological age is concerned the Kwen-lun plays the most important part amongst the Central Asian systems, for it already rose as an old folded mountain at an epoch when the ocean covered the southern parts of the actual plateau-land and its ranges. Kwen-lun is the spina dorsalis and the oldest mountain system of Asia.
I Prof. Dr. Karl Futterer: Die allgemeinen geologischen Ergebnisse der neueren Forschungen in Zentral-Asien und China. Ergänzungsheft No. 119 zu Petermann's Mitteilungen. Gotha 1896.
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