Juty 17, 1902] 
results. As to the intrinsic historical value of the discoveries 
made there can be only one opinion. It is true their full import 
will only be realised after the publication of the detailed report 
to be expected from Dr. Stein himself, and after a thorough 
examination of the archzeological specimens, photographs, 
coins and manuscripts which will occupy scholars for many 
years tocome ; but even a perusal of the ‘‘ Preliminary Report,” 
and a glance at the illustrations and plates added to it, suffice 
to show that they will shed a flood of light on the history of an 
important period, and on the manifold relations between India 
and Central Asia during the first centuries of our era. 
Dr. Stein left Srinagar on May 29. He travelled by the 
Gilgit-Hunza route, and on June 28 crossed the Kilik Pass 
and entered Chinese territory on the Taghdumbash Pamir. A 
five days’ journey down the valley of this Pamir brought him to 
Tashkurghan, the chief place of the Sarikol mountain tract, 
Marching down the plains of Kashgar, he arrived, on July 29, 
safely at the capital of Chinese Turkestan. In Kashgar he 
made the necessary preparations for his travels in the desert, 
not only by organising a fresh caravan, but also by making 
efforts to secure the good-will of the Chinese authorities for 
the intended explorations. In these efforts he was assisted, not 
only by Mr. Macartney, the diplomatic agent of the Govern- 
ment of India at Kashgar, but also by—the famous Chinese 
pilgrim of the seventh century, Hiuen-Tsiang. ‘* All educated 
Chinese officials,’ writes Dr. Stein, ‘seem to have read or 
heard legendary accounts of the famous Chinese pilgrim’s visit 
to the Buddhist kingdoms of the ‘ Western countries.” In my 
intercourse with them I never appealed in vain to the memory 
of the ‘great monk of the T’ang dynasty’ (T’ang-Sén), whose 
footsteps I was now endeavouring to trace in Turkestan, as I had 
done before in more than one part of India.” 
On September 11, Dr. Stein left Kashgar and_ started 
on his journey to Khotan, choosing for his march to Yarkand, 
not the ordinary caravan route, but a track leading through the 
desert. After a short halt in Yarkand, he proceeded on the 
caravan route leading to Khotan along the southern edge of the 
desert, following ‘‘the same great thoroughfare by which in 
earlier times the trade from the Oxus region and the far West 
passed to Khotan and to China.” A peculiar feature of this 
route and of the desert around Khotan are the ‘‘ Tatis,” as the 
natives call the ‘* extensive patches of ground where the eroded 
loess is thickly strewn with fragments of coarse pottery, bricks, 
slag, and similar refuse marking the sites of villages and hamlets 
long ago abandoned ’’—an ideal marching ground for the 
archzeological explorer. He reached Khotan town on October 12. 
The next four weeks were devoted to geographical work in 
the Kuen-luen range and Khotan mountains, whereupon he 
turned again to archzeological interests, paying a visit to the 
Kohmari ridge opposite to the village of Ujat, and examining 
old sites in the Khotan oasis, more especially those near the 
village of Yotkan, where ‘‘ treasure-seeking” has long been 
carried on along with jade-digging and gold-washing. Having 
finished the survey of ancient localities within the oasis, he 
started on December 7 on his way to Dandan-Uiliq, the site 
chosen for the first excavations in the Taklamakan desert. 
Marching through the desert, the small caravan, including a 
party of thirty labourers for the excavation work, found itself on 
December 18 in the midst of the scattered ruins of Dandan- 
Uiliq. This ruined site had been seen by Dr. Sven Hedin on 
his march to the Keriya Darya, and is spoken of in the narrative 
of his travels as ‘‘ the ancient city of Taklamakan.” For fully 
three weeks most successful excavations were carried on by Dr. 
Stein amongst these ruins. On January 6, 1go1, he left this 
neighbourhood, and marched across sand dunes, rising to a 
height of about 200 feet, to the Keriya Darya, and along the 
hard frozen river to the oasis and town of Keriya, in order 
to secure the assistance of the Amban (the Chinese district 
magistrate) for his further explorations. Making inquiries at 
Keriya about old localities, he heard of an ‘old town” in the 
desert north of the Muhammadan pilgrimage place of Imam Jafar 
Sadik. He set out in search of this ancient site, and reached 
Niya—the Ni-jang town of Hiuen-Tsiang—on January 21. 
Six days later he was among the ruins of the Niya River 
site, as Dr. Stein, in absence of any special local designation, 
calls this site, where the excavations, carried on for nearly three 
weeks, yielded the most important results of the whole journey. 
At Niya he had heard of old remains to be found in the desert 
to the east towards Cherchen, and he set outin search of them. 
Marching more than a hundred miles to the east from Imam 
NO. 1707, VOL. 66} 
NATURE 
285 
Jafar Sadik, he reached the point where the Endere stream is lost 
in the sands. A day’s march further to the south-east brought him 
to the ‘‘old town of Endere,” which was next explored. 
Interesting archzeological remains and manuscripts were brought 
to light by the excavations. Some Tibetan manuscripts found 
here showed that the easternmost point of the exploration area 
had been reached. Hence Dr. Stein began to march back to 
Keriya and Khotan. Some 150 miles north of Keriya the ruins 
of Karadong—as they are called by the nomadic shepherds 
grazing along the Keriya Darya—were visited and explored by 
Dr. Stein, before he continued his march to Khotan. The sand- 
storms and increasing heat warned him that work in the desert 
would soon become impossible. He hastened, therefore, to 
visit the ancient sites to the north-east of Khotan which had 
still to be explored. After examining the scanty ruins of Ak- 
sipil, some fifteen miles from the right bank of the Yurung-Kash 
opposite Khotan, he marched due north through the sands for 
about fourteen miles, when he reached the ancient site called 
Rawak by native ‘‘ treasure-seekers.”’ Here the last, but by no 
means the least interesting, excavations were carried on for a 
whole week. On April 18 the work was finished, and, having 
completed the programme of his explorations in the desert, Dr. 
Stein could return to the town of Khotan, where he arranged 
and carefully repacked his archeological finds. On May 1 
he set out for Kashgar, where he made arrangements for his 
journey to Europe. He left Kashgar on May 29, and travelling 
through Russian Turkestan he reached, at Andijan, the terminus 
of the Transcaspian Railway. By it he travelled to Krasnovodsk, 
crossed the Caspian to Baku, and finally, on July 2, arrived in 
London, where he was able to deposit his important collection 
—twelve large boxes, containing numerous relievos, frescoes, 
painted tablets, and other specimens of Central Asian art, coins, 
manuscripts, and more than 800 negatives on glass plates, the 
photographic results of his journey—in the British Museum. 
A three months’ period of deputation in London ha‘ to suffice 
for the provisional arrangement and cataloguing of his precious 
finds and for preparing the ‘* Preliminary Report.” 
It would require far more space than I could be allowed in 
these columns to mention only the most important results of 
Dr. Stein’s explorations. I must content myself with just 
pointing out the most striking features of the discoveries recorded 
in the ‘* Preliminary Report.” Though archzeology and his- 
torical topography were the chief interests, and the desert 
around Khotan was the principal area of the explorations made 
by Dr. Stein, he missed no opportunity, throughout the whole 
of his journey, to attend to general geographical work as well 
and to make valuable anthropological and ethnographical 
observations. 
Thus, in the interests of geography, he superintended the 
survey on the Taghdumbash Pamir and in the Sarikol mountain 
tract ; and by choosing for his march to Kashgar the route 
which passes through the valleys between the Russian Pamirs 
and the western slopes of the Muztagh-Ata range, he was able 
to extend this survey to the Muztagh-Ata and the mountain 
ranges overlooking the Little Karakul Lake. Again, on his 
march from Kashgar to Yarkand he succeeded in fixing the 
position of Ordam Padshah more accurately than is done on the 
existing maps. After his arrival in Khotan he devoted a whole- 
month to survey operations in the Kuen-luen mountain range, 
especially in that portion of it which contains the head-waters 
of the Yurung-Kash River. He also explored the hitherto 
unknown mountain tract towards the Karakash River and was 
able to complete the triangulation of the Khotan Mountains. 
Anthropometric observations were made by Dr. Stein in all 
regions offering any anthropo-geographical interest, for instance 
among the Iranian hillmen in the Sarikol settlements. Nor 
did he omit to make notes of any popular legends and folklore- 
connected with interesting localities, and often he found ‘‘ old: 
stories” which Hiuen-Tsiang had heard and recorded in the 
account of his travels, still alive among the population. The- 
tenacity with which local legends survive proved often very 
useful in the identification of old sites. Thus, near the frontier 
of the Khotan district, there is a Muhammadan shrine known as 
Kaptar-Mazar, z.e. ‘‘ the pigeon’s shrine,” at which thousands 
of pigeons are kept and propitiated by food offerings, and a 
legend is told of a great victory won with the help of pigeons 
by some Muhammadan hero over a host of Khotan unbelievers. 
Now Hiuen-Tsiang tells us that some thirty miles to the west of 
the capital of Khotan there was a range of hills supposed to 
have been formed by the burrowing of rats, the rats having been 
