Tarim mummies
SteinMummy.jpg
The Tarim mummies are a series of Caucasoid mummies which have been excavated in the Tarim Basin (Eastern Central Asia, today the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China), and dated to the 2nd and 1st millenium BC. These mummies are indicative of the migrations of Indo-European people far to the East at a very early period, suggesting the possibility of cultural exchange with the Chinese world since around 1000 BC.
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Archeological record
The first mummies were found at the beginning of the 20th century, through the expeditions of Europeans into Central Asia, in particular by the explorer Sir Aurel Stein. Since then many other mummies have been found and analysed, most of them being displayed in the museums of Xinjiang.
Most of these Europoid mummies were found on the southern part of the Tarim Basin (Khotan, Niya, Cherchen) and in the eastern parts around the area of Lopnur (Subeshi near Turfan, Kroran, Qumul).
Many of the mummies have been found in very good condition, owing to the dryness of the desert, and the desiccation of the corpses it induced. They share Europoid or Caucasoid body features (slender, elongated bodies, angular faces, recessed eyes), and many of them have their hair intact, ranging in color from blond to red to deep brown, and generally long, curly and braided. Their costumes, and especially textiles, generally indicate a common origin with European neolithic clothing techniques.
The most famous mummies are the tall, red-haired "Ur-David" or the "Cherchen man"; his son, a small 1-year-old baby with blond hair protruding from under a red and blue felt cap, and blue stones in place of the eyes; the "Hammi Mummy"; a "red-headed beauty" found in Qizilchoqa; and the "Witches of Subeshi", who wore tall pointed hats.
The mummies in history
Bai people
From the 1st-millenium sources, ancient Chinese sources describe the existence of "white people with long hair" (The Bai people of the Shanhai Jing) on their northwestern borders. They had trade relations with them, and seemed to have purchased jade from them. There is possibility that these "Bai people" correspond to the Tarim mummies.
Yuezhi
In the same geographical area, reference to the Yuezhi was made in name in 645 BC by the Chinese economist Guan Zhong, raising the possibility that the europoid mummies may have been identical and ancestors to the Yuezhi. Guan Zhong described the Yuezhi, or Niuzhi, as a people from the Tarim Basin who supplied jade to the Chinese. "It is well known that ancient Chinese rulers had a strong attachment to jade. All of the jade items excavated from the tomb of Fuhao of the Shang dynasty, more than 750 pieces, were from Khotan in modern Xinjiang. As early as the mid-first millennium BC the Yuezhi engaged in the jade trade, of which the major consumers were the rulers of agricultural China." (Liu (2001), pp. 267-268). A large part of the Yuezhi, vanquished by the Xiong Nu, were to migrate to southern Asia in the 2nd century BC, and later found the Kushan Empire in northern India.
Tocharians
The Indo-European Tocharian languages also have been attested in the same geographical area, and although the first known epigraphic evidence dates to the 6th century CE, the degree of differentiation between Tocharian A and Tocharian B, and the absence of Tocharian language remains beyond that area, tends to indicate that a common Tocharian language existed in the same area during the second half of the 1st millennium BC. Although Tocharian texts have never been found in direct relation with the mummies, their identical geographical location and common European origin tend to suggest that the mummies were somehow ancestors of the Tocharians and spoke a similar Indo-European language.
Cultural exchanges
The presence of Caucasians in the Tarim Basin in the 1st millenium BC suggests that cultural exchanges happened between western populations and Chinese populations at a very early date. It has been suggested that such technologies as chariot warfare and bronze-making may have been transmitted to the east by the Caucasian nomads.
These theories would go against the idea that the East and West developed their civilizations independent of each other, but suggest, on the contrary that, some form of transmission may have happened.
Gallery
 The beauty of Kroran. |
Ur David. |
A red-headed mummy. |
Another mummy. |
Another mummy. |
Another mummy. |
References
- The Tarim Mummies: Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West. J. P. Mallory and Victor H. Mair. Thames & Hudson. London. 2000. ISBN 0500051011
- The Mummies of Ürümchi. Elizabeth Wayland Barber. 1999. London. Pan Books. ISBN 0330368974
- Warrior Women: An Archaeologist’s Search for History’s Hidden Heroines. Jeannine Davis-Kimball with Mona Behan. Warner Books, New York. 2002. First Trade Edition 2003. ISBN 0-446-67983-6 (pbk)