Ancient European Remains Found In China

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Ancient European Remains

Found In China

ChinaView.cn

7-8-4

 

 

XINING, July 6 (Xinhuanet) -- Archeologists confirmed that the human

skeletons discovered this May in northwest China's Qinghai Province

belonged to three Europeans who lived in China over 1,900 years ago.

 

"The physical characteristics of the bones showed it is a typical

European race," said Wang Minghui, an expert with the archeological

institute under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

 

The skeletons were spotted at Zhongchuan Town of the province's

eastern most Minhe Hui and Tu Autonomous County.

 

Since 2002, archeologists have unearthed nine tombs of Han Dynasty

(206 BC-220 AD) at a construction site of a brickfield in the town,

but it was not until this May that they felt the skeletons in two

tombs "very special", said Ren Xiaoyan, deputy director if the

provincial archeological institute, who added they invited Wang, who

specializes in human bone identification, to take part in the study on

the findings.

 

Qinghai is on the southern section of the world-known land trade

corridor -- the Silk Road, linking China with Central and Western Asia

and to the eastern shores of the Mediterranean begins in the country's

northwest and runs 7,000 kilometers.

 

Serving as an important bridge for the economic and cultural exchanges

between the East and the West, the area, which the Silk Road covered

in China, used to see throngs of Indian, Persian, Arabic, Greek and

Roman people.

 

Ren said the tomb shape, the burial articles and the way they were put

in the tomb are all typical in Eastern Han Dynasty (25-220), which

proved the three westerners had lived here for a long time and were

accustomed to local traditions and customs.

 

"Although so far, we have been not sure of the country the three

Europeans came from and there might be a large number of such

'westerners' living here at the ancient time," said Ren.

 

Such European skeletons have only been revealed in northwest China's

Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, a neighboring region which is to the

northwest of Qinghai, so the discovery this time is of great

importance for the study of the ancient society in Qinghai, said Wang.

 

2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-07/06/content_1576929.htm