Professor Wang Jiqing from the Institute of Dunhuang Studies of Lanzhou University joined the "Tang West Market Silk Road Investigation Mission" and visited three sections of the Silk Road, namely the section from West Asia to Europe, the section from West Asia to Central Asia and the South Asian section from August, 2014 to February, 2015. The visits covered the main lines of the Silk Road across the Eurasian continent from west to east. The "Tang West Market Silk Road Investigation Mission" traveled more than 30,000 kilometers, visiting more than 100 cultural heritage and archaeological sites, famous museums and traditional workshops along over a dozen countries like Netherlands, Italy, Vatican, Greece, Turkey, Iran, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Nepal, India, etc., and conducted academic exchanges with local scholars. The mission collected a large number of books, images, photographs, objects, etc. on the history and current situation of the Silk Road, laying solid foundation for further study of the Silk Road.
President Xi Jinping proposed to co-build the "Silk Road Economic Belt" and the "21st century Maritime Silk Road" with countries along the Silk Road in autumn, 2013. Since then, governments along the road paid high attention to the "One Road One Belt" and actively cooperated in carrying out the initiative. It has also become the focus of all walks of life. Lv Jianzhong, CPPCC member and president of Xi'an Tang West Market, submitted a bill "On the Establishment of the Major National Cultural Projects and the Compilation of the Silk Road Investigaiton Series", which was approved later at the Second Session of the Twelfth CPPCC National Committee in 2014. Subsequently, the Specialized Committee on Silk Road of Dunhuang Turfan Association in China was set up in the Tang West Market, and Professor Hu Ji from Shaanxi Normal University was appointed as director, in charge of the writing and publishing of the Silk Road Investigation Series. To highlight the feature of “investigation” of the Silk Road Investigation Series, the Tang West Market invested heavily in the formation of "Tang West Market Silk Road Investigation Mission" and invited major authors countrywide to investigate the domestic and overseas parts of the Silk Road in different groups. In the post-war history of international investigation of the Silk Road, the "Tang West Market Silk Road Investigation Mission" is by far the largest in scale, the broadest in areas, and the longest in duration.
Professor Wang Jiqing began to study the history of cultural exchanges and archeology expeditions along the Silk Road since 1978, and was engaged in the promotion work of the "UNESCO Silk Road Research Project" in London in the late 1980s. Professor Wang Jiqing was invited to serve as sub-editor of the Silk Road Investigation Series, in charge of not only writing the volumes of The Silk Road Expeditions, Ruins of Ancient Cities along the Silk Road, etc. but also contacting, standardizing and editing other volumes of the art, archeology, history, literature and so on. The series will be published by the Zhonghua Book Company in June, 2015.
(Translated by Li Yafeng; proofread by Sissi Xu)
