National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

undertaking is contained in his Serindia, in four volumes, with a fifth containing
his 96 maps. Only a few of the many sites examined need be mentioned here.
Before starting for the desert he made a survey up the Nissa valley of the great
glaciers that feed the head-waters of the Yurung-kāsh river. This is where, two
years later, his right foot became frost-bitten, causing the loss of the toes. Having
completed the Nissa valley survey he started for the desert site of Niya, pre-
viously explored with such great results in 1901. After further discoveries there
he travelled north-east to the oasis of Charkhlik in the region of Lop. Lop (or
Lou-lan or Shan-shan) comprised, in Han times, the whole of the depression
between the Kuruk-tāgh and Āltin-tāgh with Charkhlik and Mīrān as administra-
tive centres. About fifty miles north-east of Charkhlik at the desolate ancient site
of Mīrān, he recovered the wall paintings shown on plates I to III, and photo-
graphed others which he found it impracticable to remove at that time. The
masses of important manuscripts, and other evidences of Tibetan occupation
found in the ruins of an ancient fort nearby, are described in Serindia and Innermost
Asia. From Charkhlik, the next site to be visited was Lou-lan in the Lop desert,
where carved architectural woodwork, wooden writing tablets bearing Kharoṣṭhī
script, Han coins, and many miscellaneous relics were found among the remains
of ruined dwellings. Stone Age and Chalcolithic arrowheads, frequently picked
up during the progress across the desert, afforded evidence of the use of the track
from remote times. He also identified the line of the ancient Chinese wall, built
to protect the trade routes that extended westward from the 'Jade Gate', its great
age proved by the finding in one of the towers or block-houses built along the
wall Chinese documents on wood bearing dates equivalent to the first century A.D.
It is an attractive story, recorded in Serindia, but too long to recite here.
The third of Stein's Central Asian expeditions started from Srīnagar on 31
July 1913. The route taken was different from those of his former journeys, pass-
ing through the recently formed kingdom of Darēl, never before visited by a
European, through Yāsīn, and by way of the Darkōt Pass, 15,250 feet, the Tāgh-
dumbāsh Pamīr, the valley of Tāsh-kurghān, and the Kara-tāsh river gorges to
Kāshgar. The ever-hospitable house of Sir George Macartney, British Consul-
General, again afforded him a welcome base at which to make the necessary
preparations for the forthcoming desert journey. A Chinese secretary was engaged
and at the end of a fortnight the expedition resumed its progress. Skirting the foot
of the T'ien-shan range the Taklamakān desert was entered at its eastern end,

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