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For sake of brevity I will use Xiongnu hereafter, but to designate the political alliance rather than a homogeneous culture. I use the term Chinese in the same way; see discussion and references below.

      3. A boundary that David Christian describes as “the dynamo of Inner Eurasian history” (1998: xxi).

      4. I use these terms advisedly—there was no simple dichotomy between the settled and the nomadic (peoples sometimes characterized as the civilized and the barbaric). The range of lifestyles, very much dictated by ecology for much of history, was on a continuum, with pastoralist cultures practicing agriculture to a greater or lesser degree. For an example, see Chang et al. (2003).

      5. As Paul Goldin points out on the Chinese view of the Xiongnu, “The Chinese conceived of their northern neighbours as mutatis mutandis, identical to themselves . . . greedy and primitive only because they had not benefitted from the transformative influence of sage teachers” (2011: 220).

      6. Although individuals may have attempted it.

      7. Frachetti (2011). On the spread of millet, see N. Miller, Spengler, and Frachetti (2016); Frachetti et al. (2010).

      8. Rawson (2010).

      9. Shelach-Lavi (2014: 23–26). The point that both the transmitters and the receivers of culture and technology played a role is discussed further below. The receivers have to be receptive to the new culture and technology, but their receptiveness can be encouraged in various ways by the transmitters. This also has parallels with the point in chapter 7 about Western collectors of Islamic manuscripts in the twentieth century and the roles played by the booksellers of the Muslim world.

      10. Di Cosmo (2002). For dating, see notes below.

      11. Shelach–Lavi (2014). See also Chang (2008).

      12. To quote Sima Qian, discussed in Goldin (2011: 228–29).

      13. Goldin (2011: 235). As he and others (Pines 2012a: 34) also point out, this characterization of the other is exemplified more concretely with the attempts to build walls to demarcate the boundary between the two, the so-called “Great Wall.”

      14. Vasil’ev (1961); Miniaev (2015: 323).

      15. Chin (2010: 320).

      16. See chapter 10 on the Chinese labeling of peoples on their southwestern borders as “other” and their exploitation of these peoples as slaves.

      17. For an early and influential discussion identifying the Xiongnu with the Huns, see Bernshtam (1951), and see Frumkin (1970) for a summary of scholarship based on archaeology in the Soviet period. For a more recent summary, see La Vaissière (2014), who, like Bernshtam, argues for an identification of the Xiongnu with the Huns—as well as with the Hephthalites (see chapter 5). For a recent history of the “Huns” that concurs with this view, see Kim (2016). But some scholars strongly disagree with the identification of the Xiongnu as Huns: Miniaev, for example, argues that “written sources and archaeological data contradict this” (pers. comm., October 8, 2017; see also his 2015 article).

      18. Goldin (2011: 227) and Di Cosmo (1994). The same can be said for the Huns.

      19. Ordos is a later Mongolian name. The area now lies within the provinces of Ningxia, Gansu, and Shaanxi and the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Regions in China.

      20. Di Cosmo (2002: 134–37) discusses the 307 BC debate at the Zhao court and argues against this view.

      21. For references to early programs of breeding in China, see Erkes (1940). The dependency on the steppe for the supply of military ponies continued; see chapter 6. India had similar issues; see chapter 3.

      22. Di Cosmo (1999: 892–93); Kim (2016: 20–23). Miniaev takes issue with the oft-cited interpretation that the Xiongnu moved into the Ordos at this time, arguing that the area was still occupied by “tribes of Loufang and Baiyang” (2015: 326).

      23. On the Yuezhi as both farmers and herders, see Chang et al. (2003).

      24. The battle took place at Baideng—to the east of the Ordos. The Chinese forces were led by the emperor Gaozu (r. 202–195), who only narrowly escaped capture.

      25. For discussion of the heqin, see Psarras (2003: 132–42). Many of the so-called princesses sent in such marriage alliances were not in the direct imperial line. The system continued in later periods. For an account of marriages that did involve genuine imperial princesses sent to marry Turkic Uygur kaghans in the Tang period, see “The Princess’s Tale” in Whitfield (2015b).

      26. Quoted in Kroll (2010: 113).

      27. See Kim (2016: 22) and his map on 26.

      28. The intelligence on goods and potential markets gained by Zhang Qian is usually given as a factor in the Han expansion west and the growth of trade—one of the factors in the start of the Silk Road (but certainly not the only one—see chapter 2).

      29. Pines (2012b: 34).

      30. Under the Roman emperor Hadrian (r. 117–38), walls were built throughout the empire, including northern Europe. Edward Luttwak discusses the point of such defenses and challenges the arguments that their regular breaching by enemy forces proves their failure, arguing instead that “they were intended to serve not as total barriers but rather as the one fixed element in a mobile strategy of imperial defense” (1976: 63). For an insightful discussion of the Chinese “Great Wall,” see Waldron (1990).

      31. And beyond: Reynolds quotes the 1483 work of the chronicler Jacobo Filippo Foresti da Bergamo: “The Bactrians and Parthians descended from the Scythians, as did Attila the Great. . . . Our Lombards, Hungarians, Castellani, and Goths are all descended from the Scythians. . . . The Turks too . . . came from Scythia. Indeed the nation of Scythians traces its origins back to Magog” (2012: 53).

      32. For Parthian history, see Colledge (1986).

      33. Although the capital of China for most of its history from the Qin onwards was located much further south along the Yellow River (Chang’an [Xian] and Luoyang).

      34. Miniaev (2015) points out issues with the archaeology records and the dating of these tombs. He argues that M3 is earlier and M9 much later and that these tombs belonged to separate graveyards.

      35. Xigoupan (1980: 7: 1–10) and Tian and Guo (1986).

      36. As Psarras (2003: 77) points out, the published literature makes this claim on the presence of surface finds including pottery shards, an ax, a hoe, an awl, knives, fragments of armor, and stone beads. This is hardly conclusive as evidence of a settlement.

      37. For the headdress, see Tian and Guo (1986: pl. 4) and A. Kessler (1993: 62).

      38. The earrings are shown in A. Kessler (1993: 62, fig. 35), So and Bunker (1995: 24), and Whitfield (2009: 57, cat. 27). They are not always shown in the same combination.

      39. They are usually both identified as dragons. See discussion below.

      40. As far as I know, the origin of the glass has not been explored; see chapter 2.

      41. True granulation does not use metallic solders but either heats the gold surface and the granule sufficiently to enable bonding or uses nonmetallic solders, such as copper salts. Granulation is found on earrings dating from the third millennium BC found in a grave at Ashur on the Tigris (P. Harper 1995: 55).

      42. Bunker, Watt, and Sun (2002: 114). Sun’s argument suggests that granulation is found in the Harappan culture of the Indus, but there is no evidence of this. See Wolters (1998) for the history and variations of the technique.

      43. For Akkadian-period (2334–2154 BC) earrings with granulation found in Ashur on the Tigris, see P. Harper (1995: cat. 35a–d).

      44. Although, as Linduff (2008: 181–82) points out, the data from twelve tombs can hardly been taken as representative.

      45. Di Cosmo (2002: 85). Although note his comments about the weakness of the evidence for a settlement.

      46. “The problem of the geographical-cultural origin of the form

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