Between these covers, the millennia of
mercantile and cultural exchange along the Silk Route are celebrated by
travellers and writers from Marco Polo to Sven Hedin, from William of Rubrick
to Ella Maillart. Kathleen Hopkirk has
spent a lifetime researching this vital heartland, traversed by five, inhospitable
deserts but united by ancient chains of trading oases: from the Buddhist Empire
of Kushan, to the scholarly Islamic centre at Bukhara.
