ROMAN ORIENT AND FAR EAST — SELIGMAN 561 



The kings of Ta Ts'in [the Roman Orient] always desired to send embassies to 

 China, but the Parthians wished to carry on trade with Ta Ts'in in Chinese silks 

 and therefore cut them off from communication. 31 



The T'ang world, though no larger, was far better known and more 

 easily traveled than that of any earlier period. We must picture 

 a time when artistic influences from the Hellenic, Indian, and Iranian 

 worlds were pouring into the T'ang capital, Ch'ang-an, frequented 

 by members of the most diverse peoples: pedlars and grooms from 

 Central Asia, "Greeks," Arabs, Persians, Japanese; Hindoos and 

 Jungle men from India (the last presumably in charge of elephants). 

 This list might be extended; it is no effort of the imagination, for at 

 this period there was little Chinese exclusiveDess. The T'ang was 

 perhaps the age at which plastic art reached its apogee; it was also a 

 time of great wealth and refinement, in which tomb furniture kept all 

 its old importance, and since many of the foreigners were servants, or 

 in one form or another ministered to the luxury of the wealthier 

 Chinese, there has been opened to us within the last quarter of a 

 century 32 a gallery of plastic portraits excellent in fidelity and often 

 of great beauty, which show us not ODly the Chinese of that day but 

 also the many foreigners within their gates. Some even exhibit a 

 touch of caricature — the Armenoid (so-called Jewish) nose seems to 

 have been a source of amusement even in T'ang China (pi. 3, fig. 1). 



Nor were these foreigners only servants; we know of monks and 

 warriors, the latter bearing treasure, come from afar to worship the 

 Buddha. At Chotcho, a Turfan site, there have been discovered 

 religious frescoes, paintings on stucco covering the walls of cave 

 temples, of the same class (though differing in style) as those exhibited 

 in the Oriental Gallery of the British Museum. The most imposing 

 of those discovered at Chotcho have been published by von Le Coq, 33 

 and among the paintings of monks and adorers of the Buddha are 

 represented types that clearly do not belong to the Mongol race. 

 Whether these are in any instance actual portrait studies it is impos- 

 sible to say; I have the impression that they are best regarded as 

 generalized abstractions, in which those features considered to be 

 distinctive of each type are emphasized. 



Other evidence of the reciprocal influence of West and East is 

 provided by the frequency of classical designs on Chinese ceramics 

 and by the export westward of Chinese porcelain, which for centuries 

 affected the pot fabrics of the Near East. Western influence is well 

 illustrated by the vase in the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, repro- 



" Hudson, op. cit., p. 84. 



3J T'ang grave figures, if known to Chinese dealers before this date, were not regarded as of any worth; 

 they were not collected by the Chinese and did not reach western collections. It was only when, in the 

 course of building railways in northern China, grave mounds were disturbed without disaster to the viola- 

 tors that grave-goods began to be collected and shipped westward in quantity. There are still Chinese 

 collectors who will have nothing to do with these figures, fearing the results. 



" Chotcho, Berlin, 1913. 



