Tang China and the Buddhist Silk Roads: The Historical Geographies of Daxingshan Temple
- 1 Department of Geography and Environmental Planning, Towson University, Towson, MD, USA
Abstract
Tang China’s capital was the wealthiest and most cosmopolitan city in the world from the early seventh to mid-eighth centuries. Crucial to its prestige was its tolerance of multiple religious traditions and support for long-distance commerce. The Silk Roads, a series of paths through deserts, mountains and grasslands traversing 5000 kilometers of China and Central Asia carrie d world- tr ansforming cosmologies and luxury products between China, India an d Persia. This paper explores how this dynamic circulation created sacred pla ces and iconographic landscapes in Xi’an, Shaanxi, China. I deploy insights from world history and historical geography as an interpretive framework to engage Da x ing s han, a Tantric Vajrayana temple and crucial site for the translation of Mahayana Buddhist sutras. Finally, I describe experiential fieldwork at the site, an engagement with an otherworldly sacred space that was and is a creation of a previous era of cultural globalization.
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