ABSTRACT
The recorded history of China’s relations with Central Asia, of which Xinjiang formed an integral part, extends to the Han Dynasty (206bce-220ce) during which Chinese military power extended into the region (Fletcher 1968: 207). Chinese power and influence were not to be reasserted in Central Asia until the Tang Dynasty (618-907). Tangmilitary and economic power dominated Xinjiang from the middle of the seventh to the mid-eighth century. Tang domination of Xinjiang was such that an imperial governor resided in Kucha, a predominant oasis in the Tarim Basin, and the Chinese began to extend their influence to the west, particularly in the direction of the Ferghana Valley and Tashkent, in present-day Uzbekistan. Tang imperial ambitions in Central Asia brought them into conflict with the expanding Arab Abassid caliphate and the Tang met with a disastrous defeat at the Battle of Talas, in present-day north-western Kyrgyzstan, in 751 (Soucek 2000: 67-8). The impact of this particular defeat was that Chinese dynasties never again attempted to extend their influence beyond the territories of Xinjiang. The next period of significant contact and relations between China and Central Asia came under the Mongol Yuan Dynasty (1234-1368) whereby many Central Asians were employed in service of Mongol rule in China. After the expulsion of the alien Mongols in 1368 the Ming sent numerous missions to Central Asia namely to Samarkand, Tashkent, Bukhara, Herat and even Persia (Fletcher 1968: 207). The Ming however, had neither the political will nor the military might to emulate the Yuan or Tang Dynasties’ achievements in Central Asia and the region remained outside of the Ming sphere. Ming relations with Central Asia largely remained of the ‘tributary’ variety, that is, the Ming allowed Central Asian merchants or envoys to come to China (Fletcher 1968: 216-7).
