Religions Spreading Through the Southwest Silk Road in Historical

Routes of the Spirit

Religious teachings traveled the Silk Road routes as well. There is much controversy surrounding the earliest arrival of Buddhism on the Southwestern Silk Road. Several prominent Chinese scholars concluded in the 1980s that the arrival of Buddhism along the overland route through Southwest China predated its spread into the Central China Plain. This bit of historical revisionism now seems premature, as archaeological evidence indicates that the overland Southwestern Silk Road was only connected by the Eastern Han period, after Buddhist pilgrims had already crossed into the Han Empire to the north. Nonetheless, in areas of Sichuan and Yunnan one can see evidence of Buddhist statuary produced by pilgrims who arrived early in the Common Era. Almost all scholars agree that after the third century CE Buddhist pilgrims traveling along southwestern routes to and from South Asian centers of Buddhist learning increased considerably, thereby creating cultural overlaps of historical significance.

Buddhism entered the region of Southwest China by several different routes, and the three leading schools of Buddhist thought, Theravada, Mahayana, and Tibetan Buddhism all made their presence felt along different spurs of the Southwest Silk Road. The kingdoms of Nanzhao and Dali in turn absorbed elements of all three traditions. As mentioned above, the northeastern region of South Asia around Assam produced the original Tantric Buddhist teachings that spread to Tibet by way of the "Tea and Horse Trade" routes into northwestern Yunnan. Theravada teachings spread along maritime routes and through northern Mainland Southeast Asia into southern and central Yunnan. The southwest border region of Sipsongpannā has long practiced Theravada Buddhism, although this particular school may not predate the early Ming dynasty.Mahayana teachings came into eastern Yunnan from China and northern Vietnam. Buddhism had a profound effect on the political states that emerged along the Southwestern Silk Road before the period of Mongol conquest. Both the Nanzhao and the later Dali rulers of Yunnan enhanced their authority and political control with notions of Buddhist kingship.

Islam began to spread more widely in the region in the 13th century with the Mongol Conquest of Southwest China, but after that point Muslim Hui merchants were able to settle in communities along the trade routes. The Mongol ruler Kublai Khan appointed Sayyid Ajali Omar Shams ud-Din, a native of Bukhara, governor-general of Yunnan, and filled other positions with high-ranking Muslim personnel. From the Ming dynasty caravan routes used by Hui merchants from Dali and Kunming southwest to Chiang Mai became important trade routes, carrying 700 to 1,000 mules in trade by the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. From Chiang Mai and the Burmese trade market, this overland trade would also link up with ports on the Indian Ocean trade network, and circulate goods throughout the region. Chinese Muslims with roots in Yunnan were among the seamen taken on board by the eunuch admiral Zheng He, himself a Yunnan native, when he sought out able sailors for his famous seven voyages of the Star Fleet (1403-1433).