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56-663: The Sumpa identified as the people known to the Chinese as the Supi ( 蘇毗 ) or Sunpo ( 孫波 ). The Tangshu , chap. 221b, says that the people of the country of Supi (Sumpa) were originally of Western Qiang descent. The Qiang had been in the region for a very long time – they were the main foreign enemies of the Shang dynasty (c. 1600–1046 BCE). It has been suggested by Christopher I. Beckwith that their name may have derived from an Indo-European root meaning 'charioteer'. After they were annexed by

112-773: A Tibetan dialect. The Sumpa/Supi are associated with the Supiya of Kharosthi documents of about 300 CE from the Tarim Basin . They are described as being among the invaders of the Kingdom of Khotan ('the red-faced (Tibetans), Huns, Chinese, Supiya'). To the Khotanese, who had been a settled people for about a thousand years, they appeared as savage and uncouth. They are also mentioned as having been in Niya and Cherchen . The Supi have also been closely associated with mysterious "Kingdoms of Women" during

168-551: A fervently Buddhist city-state boasting some 400 temples in the late 9th/early 10th century—four times the number recorded by Xuanzang around 630. The kingdom was independent but was intermittently under Chinese control during the Han and Tang dynasties. After the Tang dynasty, Khotan formed an alliance with the rulers of Dunhuang. Khotan enjoyed close relations with the Buddhist centre at Dunhuang:

224-563: A new history of the Tang dynasty was commissioned; with Ouyang Xiu and Song Qi as editors, the New Book of Tang was then produced. After the New Book was presented, the original Old Book of Tang went out of print, and over centuries it became very rare. It was during the Ming dynasty when the remaining copies were gathered and the book was once again published, eventually becoming canonised as one of

280-855: A report from the Uyghur American Association , in June 2012, notice was said to be given that police planned to undertake a search of every residence in Gujanbagh (Gujiangbage), Hotan. Hotan is the last municipality in Xinjiang with a majority Ugyhur presence in the core of the city. The UAA viewed this as an attempt to systematically intimidate the Uyghur population in Hotan. The Sultanim Cemetery ( 37°07′02″N 79°56′04″E  /  37.11722°N 79.93444°E  / 37.11722; 79.93444 ) in central Hotan

336-436: Is located in the town of Lasqi ( 拉斯奎 ) northwest of the city proper. Passenger train service on this line is limited, with only one train per day, local service 5828/5825, linking the city with Kashgar (8~ hours) and Ürümqi (~34 hours). Regular bus services link Hotan with Kashgar. There is also an express bus to Aksu via the 430 km (270 mi) 'Hotan-Aksu Cross-Desert Highway' which was opened in 2007, travels alongside

392-435: Is partly due to boundary changes. Hetian Kungang Airport (IATA: HTN ) serves the city. It serves regional flights to Ürümqi . Originally a military use airport, it was expanded significantly in 2002 to accommodate higher passenger volumes. It is located 12 km (7.5 mi) south of the city proper. Hotan is served by China National Highway 315 , which runs along the southern Tarim Basin from Ruoqiang to Kashgar, and

448-576: Is situated in the Tarim Basin some 1,500 kilometres (930 mi) southwest of the regional capital, Ürümqi . It lies just north of the Kunlun Mountains , which are crossed by the Sanju , Hindutash and Ilchi passes. The town, located southeast of Yarkant County and populated almost exclusively by Uyghurs , is a minor agricultural center. An important station on the southern branch of the historic Silk Road , Hotan has always depended on two strong rivers,

504-429: Is soft, light and graceful tie-dyed silk fabric. It comes various colors, the brighter and rich colors are for small children to young ladies. The gray and dark colors are for elderly women. The oldest piece of kilim which we have any knowledge was obtained by the archaeological explorer Aurel Stein ; a fragment from an ancient settlement near Hotan, which was buried by sand drifts about the fourth century CE. The weave

560-632: Is the first classic historical work about the Tang dynasty , comprising 200 chapters, and is one of the Twenty-Four Histories . Originally compiled during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period (10th century AD), it was superseded by the New Book of Tang , which was compiled in the Song dynasty , but later regained acceptance. The credited editor was chief minister Liu Xu , but the bulk (if not all) of

616-428: Is the longest and most detailed, showing the relative importance placed on ceremonial matters. This section includes descriptions of temple design, sacrifices, and festivals. The section on geography (volumes 38–41) contains a description of the regional administration of the Tang empire around the year 752. The section on officials (volumes 42–44) contains a description of the Tang administrative system. The section on

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672-503: Is therefore most likely that the original name of Hotan was Sanskritic in origin, a consequence of ancient Indian settlement in the region. An alternative etymology is proposed by Harold Walter Bailey , an expert in the Khotanese language . He believes the oldest indigenous name to be Hvatana . Hotan was known to 19th-century European explorers as Ilchi . The official Uyghur-to-Latin transliteration, and therefore English spelling, of

728-538: The Tongdian of Du You . These sources were often directly copied from records and earlier histories, and the result would be severely criticised during the Northern Song ; Emperor Renzong of Song , for example, called the book "poorly organised, burdened with unimportant details, wanting in style and poorly researched". These errors even included duplicated biographies of characters. Because of these criticisms, in 1044

784-583: The Twenty-Four Histories . Hotan Hotan (also known by other names ) is a major oasis town in southwestern Xinjiang , an autonomous region in Northwestern China . The city proper of Hotan broke off from the larger Hotan County to become an administrative area in its own right in August 1984. It is the seat of Hotan Prefecture . With a population of 408,900 (2018 census), Hotan

840-580: The Kara-Khitan Khanate , after which it was ruled by the Mongols . When Marco Polo visited Khotan in the 13th century, he noted that the people were all Muslim. He wrote that: Khotan was "a province eight days’ journey in extent, which is subject to the Great Khan . The inhabitants all worship Mahomet . It has cities and towns in plenty, of which the most splendid, and the capital of the province, bears

896-632: The Karakash River and the White Jade River , to provide the water needed to survive on the southwestern edge of the vast Taklamakan Desert . The White Jade River still provides water and irrigation for the town and oasis. Hotan and its surrounding area were originally known as Godana in ancient Sanskrit cosmological texts. The Chinese transcribed the name as 于窴 , pronounced Gudana in Middle Chinese ( Yutian in modern Standard Chinese );

952-607: The Kingdom of Khotan . In the 10th century, Khotan began a struggle with the Kara-Khanid Khanate , a Turkic state. The Kara-Khanid ruler, Sultan Satuq Bughra Khan , had converted to Islam : Satuq's son, Musa, began to put pressure on Khotan in the mid-10th century, and sometime before 1006 Yusuf Qadir Khan of Kashgar besieged and took the city. This conquest of Buddhist Khotan by the Muslim Turks—about which there are many colourful legends—marked another watershed in

1008-413: The Kunlun Mountains to the south in the summer, but it is generally of poorer quality than that found in the rivers. Khotanese textiles were mentioned by Xuanzang , who visited the oasis in 644 CE. In his Biography it is stated: "It produced carpets and fine felt, and the felt-makers also spun coarse and fine silk." Ancient Chinese-Khotanese relations were so close that the oasis emerged as one of

1064-629: The Republican era in China , warlords and local ethnic self-determination movements wrestled over control of Xinjiang. Abdullah Bughra , Nur Ahmad Jan Bughra , and Muhammad Amin Bughra declared themselves Emirs of Khotan during the Kumul Rebellion . Tunganistan was an independent administered region in the southern part of Xinjiang from 1934 to 1937. The territory included the oases of the southern Tarim Basin;

1120-505: The Sampul tapestry , showing the face of Caucasoid man which was made of threads of 24 shades of color. The tapestry had been cut up and fashioned into trousers worn by one of the deceased. An Anthropological study of 56 individuals showed a primarily Caucasoid population. A study in 2010 showed that an Eastern Eurasian lineage common in Siberia dominates the mitochondrial DNA of the mummies from

1176-867: The Sui dynasty (581–617 CE). It is also known as Eastern Kingdom of Women  [ zh ] 東女國. "A queen of the Suvarṇagotra in the western 女國 Niu-kuo [Pinyin: Nüguo ] of women was called in Chinese Su-p'i , which may indicate a woman of the Supīya ." The Tibetan Annals record that the Tibetans took the territory of Śo-čhigs of the Sumpa in 692 and in 702 the Emperor Tridu Songtsen and his Council made an inspection of Sumpa territory. According to documents from Dunhuang

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1232-451: The Tarim mummies were found in the region. At Sampul, east of the city of Hotan, there is an extensive series of cemeteries scattered over an area about 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) wide and 23 km (14 mi) long. The excavated sites range from about 300 BCE to 100 CE. The excavated graves have produced a number of fabrics of felt , wool , silk and cotton and even a fine bit of tapestry,

1288-570: The Xiaohe Cemetery . Their Y chromosome is distributed throughout Eastern Europe, South Asia, Central Asia, and Siberia. There is a relative abundance of information on Hotan readily available for study. The main historical sources are to be found in the Chinese histories (particularly detailed during the Han and early Tang dynasties) when China was interested in control of the Western Regions ,

1344-506: The Xiongnu in 176 BCE, the trade of Khotanese jade into China was controlled by the nomadic Yuezhi . The Chinese still refer to the Yurungkash as the White Jade River , alluding to the white jade recovered from its alluvial deposits . The light-colored jade is called "Mutton fat" jade. Most of the jade is now gone, with only a few kilos of good quality jade found yearly. Some is still mined in

1400-415: The cemetery was demolished and the western part of the land turned into a parking lot. Hotan has a temperate zone, cold desert climate ( Köppen BWk ), with a mean annual total of only 36.5 millimetres (1.44 in) of precipitation falling on 17.3 days of the year. Due to its southerly location in Xinjiang just north of the Kunlun Mountains , during winter it is one of the warmest locations in

1456-506: The Advisor, Mangporje, brought "the whole country of the Sumpa under tribute" under Songtsen Gampo probably c . 627. Although the original annexation of the Sumpa by the Chinese appears to have been basically peaceful, and the Sumpa were gradually assimilated into the general Tibetan population, there were occasional tensions between the two groups. The Old Tibetan Chronicle says that Myang Mangporje advised Songtsen Gampo against attacking

1512-504: The Islamicisation and Turkicisation of the Tarim Basin , and an end to local autonomy of this southern Tarim city state. Some Khotanese Buddhist works were unearthed. The rulers of Khotan were aware of the menace they faced since they arranged for the Mogao grottoes to paint a growing number of divine figures along with themselves. Halfway in the 10th century Khotan came under attack by

1568-422: The Khotanese royal family intermarried with Dunhuang élites, visited and patronized Dunhuang's Buddhist temple complex, and donated money to have their portraits painted on the walls of the Mogao grottos. Through the 10th century, Khotanese royal portraits were painted in association with an increasing number of deities in the caves. Besides this, a particular site, Melikawat functioned as a major Buddhist center in

1624-670: The Qarakhanid ruler Musa, and in what proved to be a pivotal moment in the Turkification and Islamification of the Tarim Basin , the Karakhanid leader Yusuf Qadir Khan conquered Khotan around 1006. Yūsuf Qadr Khān was a brother or cousin of the Muslim ruler of Kashgar and Balasagun , Khotan lost its independence and between 1006 and 1165, became part of the Kara-Khanid Khanate . Later it fell to

1680-568: The Qing dynasty along with the rest of Xinjiang. The town suffered severely during the Dungan Revolt (1862–1877) against the Qing rule and again a few years later when Yaqub Beg of Kashgar made himself master of Kashgaria, ruling the newly founded Turkic state known at the time as Yettishar . However, Xinjiang was reconquered by the Qing dynasty by 1877 and was converted into a province in 1884. Qing imperial authority collapsed in 1912. During

1736-523: The Southern Silk Route from the mid-eighth to mid-ninth century CE. A major administrative division or "horn" of Tibet (there were six altogether), was named "Sumpa-ru". It was in northeastern Tibet ( Amdo ) near Miran , and soldiers were sent from there to man camps at Mazar-tagh and Miran in the southern Tarim Basin . Old Book of Tang The Old Book of Tang , or simply the Book of Tang ,

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1792-681: The Sumpa, who had been among his father Namri Songtsen ’s feudatory states. "Instead he offered protection for their flocks, wherefore, in the words of the Chronicle, ‘all their households were naturally captured as subjects.’" Along with the 'Asha ( Tuyuhun ) they were rapidly absorbed by the Yarlung dynasty during the 7th and 8th centuries CE. After their submission to the Tibetans from the Yarlung Valley , they were stationed in Minyak or modern Amdo , to guard

1848-555: The Tibetans they took the name of Sunpo (= Sumpa). They were the largest of the tribes in the region and consisted of some 30,000 family units. Their territory extended from the border of the Domi people to the east as far as the Houmangxia (or Houmang Gorge) Pass in the west. The location of the Supi/Sumpa kingdom in the 7th–8th centuries in northeastern Tibet stretched from the southern bank of

1904-681: The Trans-Taklamakan Desert Highway, which run north to Luntai. An expressway is being built between Hotan and Karakax County (Moyu) as of 2014. Hotan is connected to the rest of China's rail network via the Kashgar–Hotan Railway , which opened to freight traffic in December 2010, and passenger service in June 2011. The railway station was constructed by a company under the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps , and

1960-725: The Yak River (Chinese: Tongtian River – known in Tibetan as the Chu-dmar, the largest upper course of the 'Bri-chu or Yangtze River ) in the east about 1,400 li (roughly 452 km) southwest to the Houmangxia Pass (= the Ta-tsang-la) and ranged at times as far as Khotan . The Sumpa were considered part of the Tibetan kingdom as early as the 6th century CE, in the time of Songtsen Gampo 's father Namri Songtsen , and are thought to have spoken

2016-736: The accounts of several Chinese pilgrim monks , a few Buddhist histories of Hotan that have survived in Classical Tibetan and a large number of documents in the Iranian Saka language and other languages discovered, for the most part, early this century at various sites in the Tarim Basin and from the hidden library at the Mogao Caves near Dunhuang . In the Hellenistic period, there was an Indo-Greek colony in Khotan. The ancient Kingdom of Khotan

2072-604: The centre of the region was Khotan. Beginning with the Islamic rebellion in 1937 , Hotan and the rest of the province came under the control of warlord Sheng Shicai . Sheng was later ousted by the Kuomintang . Shortly after the Communists won the civil war in 1949, Hotan was incorporated into the People's Republic of China. In 1983/4, the urban area of Hotan was administratively split from

2128-665: The city only receives 2,587 hours of bright sunshine annually, which is on the low end for Xinjiang; monthly percent possible sunshine ranges from 50% in March to 75% in October. The city includes four subdistricts , three towns , five townships and two other areas: Others: Hotan is largely dominated by the Uyghurs, and as of 2015, 311,050 of the 348,289 residents of the county were Uyghur , 35,897 were Han Chinese and 1,342 were from other ethnic groups. In 1940, Owen Lattimore quoted

2184-415: The earliest centres of silk manufacture outside China. There are good reasons to believe that the silk-producing industry flourished in Hotan as early as the 5th century. According to one story, a Chinese princess given in marriage to a Khotan prince brought to the oasis the secret of silk-manufacture, "hiding silkworms in her hair as part of her dowry", probably in the first half of the 1st century CE. It

2240-785: The eastern frontier against the Chinese. According to Tangshu 221b; during the Tianbao era (742–755), the Sumpa king, Molingzan, wanted to submit to the Chinese Empire with all his people, but he was killed by the Tibetans. His son Xinuo, accompanied by some dignitaries, sought refuge in Longyou in Gansu . The Governor sent them with an escort to the capital where the Emperor, Xuanzong (reigned 712–756 CE), treated them with great honours. The Xin Tangshu 216a places

2296-640: The editing work was actually completed by his predecessor Zhao Ying . The authors include Zhang Zhao , Jia Wei ( 賈緯 ), and Zhao Xi ( 趙熙 ). The Old Book of Tang comprises 200 volumes. Volumes 1–20 contain the annals of the Tang emperors. Twitchett notes that coverage over time in the annals is most dense during the early and middle Tang, including only very sparse information in the late Tang after 847. Volumes 21–50 contain treatises, including rites, music, calendar, astronomy , five elements, geography, officials, carriages and clothes, literature, food and commodities, and law. The section on rites (volumes 21–27)

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2352-430: The five elements ( 五行 ) contains a description of earthquakes, floods, and other natural events. Volumes 51–200 contain biographical related content, including empresses and consorts (51–52), imperial families, and the peoples populating the areas bordering the Tang empire (194–200). The book's compiling began when the Later Jin 's founding emperor Shi Jingtang ordered its compilation in 941. The original chief editor

2408-416: The intermittent Hotan River , and which takes about 5 or 6 hours. This same bus then goes on to Urumchi taking a total of about 21 hours from Hotan. As of 1885 , there was about 100,000 acres (662,334 mu ) of cultivated land in Khotan. Chinese historical sources indicate that Hotan was the main source of the nephrite jade used in ancient China . For several hundred years, until they were defeated by

2464-419: The junction of the southern (and most ancient) branch of the Silk Road joining China and the West with one of the main routes from ancient India and Tibet to Central Asia and distant China. It provided a convenient meeting place where not only goods, but technologies, philosophies, and religions were transmitted from one culture to another. Tocharians lived in this region over 2000 years ago. Several of

2520-487: The larger Hotan County , and from then on governed as a county-level city. On July 11, 2006, the townships of Jiya and Yurungqash (Yulongkashi) in Lop County and Tusalla (Tushala) in Hotan County were transferred to Hotan City. Following the July 2009 Ürümqi riots , ethnic tensions rose in Xinjiang and in Hotan in particular. As a result, the city has seen occasional bouts of violence. In June 2011, Hotan opened its first passenger-train service to Kashgar , which

2576-401: The modern city's name is "Hotan" according to the Register of Chinese Geographic Places . The Hanyu pinyin romanization Hetian has been used on some maps and by some airports. The city's former Chinese name was written with a different character for tian ( simplified Chinese : 阗 ; traditional Chinese : 闐 ; pinyin : tián ). The oasis of Hotan is strategically located at

2632-405: The population of Khotan to be estimated as 26,000. In 1998 the urban population was recorded at 154,352, 83% of which were Uyghurs, and 17% were Han Chinese. In 1999, 83.01% of the population was Uyghur and 16.57% of the population was Han Chinese. In the 2000 census, the population was recorded as 186,123. In the 2010 census figure, the figure had risen to 322,300. The increase in population

2688-435: The pronunciation eventually morphed into Khotan . In the 7th century, the Chinese Buddhist monk and scholar Xuanzang attempted to remedy this lexical change. Xuanzang, who was well-versed in Sanskrit, proposed that the traditional name was in fact Kustana ( गौस्तन ) and asserted it meant "breast of the earth". However, this was likely borrowed from the Tibetan name for the region, Gosthana , which means "land of cows". It

2744-447: The region, with average high temperatures remaining above freezing throughout the year. The monthly 24-hour average temperature ranges from −3.9 °C (25.0 °F) in January to 25.8 °C (78.4 °F) in July, and the annual mean is 13.03 °C (55.5 °F). The diurnal temperature variation is not large for a desert, averaging 11.8 °C (21.2 °F) annually. Although no month averages less than half of possible sunshine,

2800-400: The same name as that of the province…It is amply stocked with the means of life. Cotton grows here in plenty. It has vineyards, estates and orchards in plenty. The people live by trade and industry; they are not at all warlike". The Qing dynasty of China conquered the Dzungar Khanate during the final stage of the Dzungar–Qing Wars in the late 1750s. By 1760, Hotan became the territory of

2856-428: The submission of the son of the Supi king in 755. It gives his name as Xinuoluo and says that he was granted the title of Huaiyi ("he who cherishes justice") Prince, and was given the family name of Li. It adds, "The Supi are a powerful tribe." Evidence from documents on woodslips found near modern-day Hotan shows that "Tibetan armies, including previously subjugated Sumpa and Zhangzhung elements" were stationed along

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2912-490: Was Zhao Ying , who was also the chancellor then. However, by the time of its completion, Liu Xu had become chancellor and taken over the work of organisation; as a result he was credited as chief editor when the work was presented in 945 to Emperor Chu of Jin . Being a relatively quickly compiled work of official history, the Old Book of Tang was a compilation of earlier annals, now lost; it further incorporates other monographs and biographies, using as sources (for instance)

2968-449: Was a historical Uyghur graveyard that also included a religious shrine. According to a 2019 interview by the Uyghur Human Rights Project , the cemetery entombed four commanders of Sultan Satuq Bughra Khan, who conquered the city around 960 CE and spread Islam. Due to space limitations after over a thousand years of burials, multiple bodies had to reuse the same grave, and additionals layers were dug underneath old ones. Between 2018 and 2019,

3024-416: Was established as a special economic zone following the riots. In July of the same year, a bomb and knife attack occurred on the city's central thoroughfare. In June 2011, authorities in Hotan Prefecture sentenced Uyghur Muslim Hebibullah Ibrahim to ten years imprisonment for selling "illegal religious materials". In June 2012, Tianjin Airlines Flight 7554 was hijacked en route from Hotan to Ürümqi. In

3080-456: Was from Khotan that the eggs of silkworms were smuggled to Iran , reaching Justinian I 's Constantinople in 551. Silk production is still a major industry employing more than a thousand workers and producing some 150 million metres of silk annually. Silk weaving by Uyghur women is a thriving cottage industry , some of it produced using traditional methods. Atlas is the fabric used for traditional Uyghur clothing worn by Uyghur women. It

3136-448: Was one of the earliest Buddhist states in the world and a cultural bridge across which Buddhist culture and learning were transmitted from India to China. Its capital was located to the west of the modern city of Hotan. The inhabitants of the Kingdom of Khotan, like those of early Kashgar and Yarkant , spoke Saka , one of the Eastern Iranian languages . Khotan's indigenous dynasty (all of whose royal names are Indian in origin) governed

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