Unit 5 Silk Road

The Silk Road or Silk Route is an interconnected series of routes through Southern Asia traversed by caravan and ocean vessel, and connecting eastern China with Asia Minor, as well as other points. It extends over 8,000 km (5,000 miles). Its influence carried over into Japan and Korea.

The Silk Road in the 1st century.

These exchanges were significant not only for the development and flowering of the great civilizations of China, ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Persia, India and Rome but also helped to lay the foundations of the modern world.

The continental Silk Road diverges into northern and southern routes as it extends from the commercial centers of North China, the northern route passing through the Bulgar–Kypchak zone to Eastern Europe and the Crimean peninsula, and from there across the Black Sea, Marmara Sea and the Balkans to Venice; the southern route passing through Turkestan–Khorasan into Mesopotamia and Anatolia, and then through Antioch in Southern Anatolia into the Mediterranean Sea or through the Levant into Egypt and North Africa.

The Silk Road on the Sea extends from South China, to present-day Philippines, Brunei, Siam, Malacca, Ceylon, India, Iran, Egypt, Italy, Portugal and Sweden. On August 7, 2005 it was reported that the Antiquity and Monument Office of Hong Kong was planning to propose the Silk Road on the Sea as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Silk road is a translation from the German Seidenstraße. The first person who used the term was the German geographer Ferdinand von Richthofen during 1877.