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0079 On Ancient Central-Asian Tracks : vol.1
On Ancient Central-Asian Tracks : vol.1 / Page 79 (Color Image)

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doi: 10.20676/00000214
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foot of the Nan-shan, and thus cut off the Tarim basin from
all direct communication with the Chinese Empire. Yet the
Chinese administrators and garrisons within the Tarim
basin, notwithstanding their isolation, succeeded in holding
out for another forty years—an heroic but obscure chapter
in history.

The period of about four hundred years following the
disappearance of T'ang rule is for the most part a dark one
in the history of the Tarim basin. We know that Tibetan
domination in that region did not outlast a century and
also that Islam was spreading under the Turkish chiefs who
acquired control over Kashgar and other oases in the
western portion of the Tarim basin. From about the middle
of the tenth century onwards this led to the gradual over-
throw of Buddhist doctrine and culture by force as well as
by propaganda.

In the north-eastern portion, however, and in the out-
lying territory of Turfan, Buddhism continued to flourish
much longer, side by side with Manichaeism and Nestorian
Christianity, under the protection of Uighur chiefs. To the
predominance of those chiefs and to the capacity shown
elsewhere, too, by Turkish tribes to digest other racial
elements from conquered populations more advanced in
civilization we must attribute the fact that throughout the
Tarim basin Eastern Turkish is now, and has been for
centuries, the only language spoken. Yet the population
there still retains in the main the Homo Alpinus type, pre-
served in purity by the Iranian-speaking hillmen of the
Pamir region (Fig. 133), and represented also in Western
Europe, and shows but slight admixture of true Turkish
blood.

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