Ancient Khotan : vol.1 / 349 ページ（白黒高解像度画像）

0349	Ancient Khotan : vol.1
古代コータン : vol.1

which appears to exclude the possibility of the Keriya river having ever in historical times flowed and Keriya
in the immediate vicinity of the site : I mean the relatively high level of the latter. The river.
hypsometrical heights ascertained by me show that the ancient ground-level of the Dandān-Uiliq
site in the immediate vicinity of the depression referred to lies 200 feet higher than the bank
of the Keriya Daryā at Kochkar-Öghil, where the river is nearest. The approximate accuracy
of this estimated difference of level may the more be relied upon since it agrees exactly with
the difference shown in Dr. Hedin's map ¹². Now it seems to me exceedingly difficult to believe
that the Keriya river should until eleven hundred years ago—geologically speaking a mere
yesterday—have at this point followed a course fully 200 feet higher than the one which it
follows now, and which lies in the direct line of its drainage. With nothing but soft loess or
drift-sand to resist its course after the débouchure from the mountains the river must have found
its bed within the depressed area where it now flows long before any historical period. Within
this depression it may shift its bed to the west or east as long as its waters keep to the lowest
level, but only engineering works on a large scale could ever force its whole volume to the high
ground of Dandān-Uiliq ¹³.

From the levels recorded by Dr. Hedin and myself, it is clear that the ruins of Dandān- Watershed
Uiliq with the lands once surrounding them are situated on a band of high ground which near Dan-
forms the watershed between the Yurung-kāsh and Keriya rivers, and this fact has undoubtedly dān-Uiliq.
its antiquarian interest. Most unlikely as the line of a river-course, this is just the ground which
the makers of an irrigation canal would for preference follow, as any properly contoured canal
map of the Punjab or similarly irrigated area would show at a glance. By keeping to the line
of highest level, a canal not only commands the maximum area of land capable of irrigation,
but is also more easily protected against breaches by natural drainage channels and similar
disturbing influences.

In view of the facts just set forth, it is impossible to accept the theory of a great shift of Causes of
the Keriya Daryā as an explanation why the site of Dandān-Uiliq was deserted and has remained permanent
unoccupied ever since. The immediate cause of the abandonment at the close of the eighth abandon-
century is indicated with sufficient clearness by the antiquarian evidence already specified; but ment.
there remains still the question as to the physical causes which have helped to render that
abandonment permanent. The question seems to me closely connected with a far larger one,
that of the desiccation which is assumed to have gradually been proceeding over large portions
of Central Asia within historical periods. The consideration of this problem with special regard
to the Khotan region is a task for which properly established archaeological data may be most
helpful, but which itself can be dealt with only on a geographical basis, and it must therefore
remain outside the scope of this work. The case of Dandān-Uiliq would prove of particular
interest in connexion with this problem if conclusive topographical evidence were to confirm
the view which I have set forth above, and which appears to me by far the most probable,
viz. that a canal fed by one or several of the streams now irrigating the oases of Chira, Gulakhma,

国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト
『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ

引用情報

OCR読み取り結果

国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト 『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ

引用情報

OCR読み取り結果

国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト
『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ