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Determining the Value of Textiles in the Tang Dynasty In Memory of Professor Denis Twitchett (1925–2006)1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 July 2013

ANGELA SHENG
ANGELA SHENG*
Affiliation:
McMaster University
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Extract

How did people in Tang dynasty China view textiles and how did they conceive of their value? Those involved in production could calculate the value in terms of the costs of raw materials, labour and the loom used to weave a particular textile. They might add to this the costs of workshop supervision and maintenance, distribution and marketing, and they might expect to see some benefit – a profit – in the process. However, most people would be end users, and would reckon the value of textiles by eye, if not also by hand, and what they considered to be the market value. Some might have expert knowledge, but many would not. The non-expert evaluation by eye and hand would likely include aspects such as colour, pattern, level of workmanship and intricacy but would probably also reflect some awareness of status and fashion.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 23 , Issue 2: Textiles as Money on the Silk Road , April 2013 , pp. 175 - 195
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 2013 

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Footnotes

1

Long ago when Profressor Twitchett met me in his office at Princeton to discuss research topics, he had hoped that I would tackle the relationship between textiles and taxation in the Tang in my dissertation. Long after I finished my dissertation on rural textile production in the Song, I am finally able to address some aspects of this issue that he had first raised with me back then. I am grateful for his foresight and encouragement. For this opportunity and for their editorial refinement, I thank Helen Wang and Valerie Hansen. Thanks also go to Zhao Feng for sharing the resources at the National Silk Museum in Hangzhou in 2010. Travel was funded in part by McMaster Arts Research Board Conference Grant, acknowledged with gratitude.

References

2 Einzig, Paul, Primitive Money in its Ethnological Historical and Economic Aspects (Oxford, 1966), p. 321 Google Scholar.

3 Einzig, Primitive Money, p. 20.

4 von Glahn, Richard, Fountain of Fortune: Money and Monetary Policy in China, 1000—1700 (Berkeley, 1996)Google Scholar. For direct quotes below, see pp. 15, 16–18, 23 and 25.

5 That is, in the highly hierarchically organised Confucian society, the ruler was the most important patriarch of his empire, responsible for the welfare of the people and, as such, and mandated by heaven, was morally obligated to provide for their basic needs. The emperor (state) did so by providing land for farmers to cultivate and in return collected taxes (rent) partially in kind and redistributed the taxed grain and textiles. This practice persists today, though sometimes in disguise. Civil servants (including university professors) are still paid in money and in kind – for example, subsidised housing – both in Taiwan and on the mainland. Even during the early Communist period, until the economic reforms in the late 1970s, state workers also received coupons for oil, grain and fuel for heating. It also explains the attitude of entitlement many Chinese working for the state espouse.

6 Gell, A., “The Technology of Enchantment and the Enchantment of Technology,” in Shelton, Anthony et al. (eds), Anthropology, Art, and Aesthetics (Oxford, 1992), pp. 40–63.Google Scholar

7 Bolland, R., A Loom from Bhutan; with an Introduction by Alet Kapma and Wouter Ton (Amsterdam, 1995), p. 11 Google Scholar.

8 Contrary to popular misconception, flax was not indigenous to China (but was to India) so that no linen was ever produced in early China. Hence, we translate ma 麻 as hemp and zhuma 苧麻 as ramie, and not as linen.

9 For a detailed and seminal discussion on spinning and silk-reeling, see Kuhn, D., Textile Technology: Spinning and Reeling, part IX of vol. 5, Chemistry and Chemical Technology, Science and Civilization in China (Cambridge, 1988)Google Scholar, and for an ethnographic report on felting, see M, and Gervers, V., “Felt-making Craftsmen of the Anatolian and Iranian Plateau”, Textile Museum Journal Vol. IV, No. 1 (1974), pp. 15–29 Google Scholar and Levine, L. D., “Notes on Felt-Making and the Production of Other Textiles at She Gabi, a Kurdish Village”, in Gervers, V. (ed.), Studies in Textile History (Toronto, 1977), pp. 202–213 Google Scholar.

10 Zohary, D. and Hopf, M., Domestication of Plants in the Old World (Oxford, 2000)Google Scholar.

11 For a brief discussion on woollens, see Wu Min, “The Exchange of Weaving Technologies between China and Central and Western Asia from the Third to the Eighth Century Based on New Textile Finds in Xinjiang”, translated by Angela Sheng, in Regula Schorta (ed.) Central Asian Textiles and Their Contexts in the Early Middle Ages, Riggisberger Berichte 9 (2006), pp. 211–242, especially pp. 212–213. For analyses on the cottons, see Bingquan, Zhang, “Zhongguo gudai de mian zhipin” [Cotton textiles in ancient China] in Lishi yuyan yanjiusuo jikan, (Taipei, 1981) Vol. 52, No. 2 pp. 203–233 Google Scholar and Trombert, E., Le Crédit à Dunhuang, vie matérielle et société en Chine médiévale (Paris, 1995)Google Scholar. For a discussion of both cottons and woollens in early South Asia, see Lad, Gouri P., “Textiles in the Vinaya Pitaka”, Bulletin of the Deccan College Research Institute (Professor H. D. Sankalia Memorial Volume) 49 (1990), pp. 227–235 Google Scholar (Thanks to Shayne Clarke, a colleague at McMaster, for bringing this to my attention).

12 Also known in English as ‘plain weave’.

13 For the clearest definitions of textile terms in English and illustrations, see Burnham, Dorothy, Warp and Weft: A Textile Terminology (Toronto, 1980)Google Scholar. Her definitions correspond to those proposed by members, including British textile historians, of the Centre International d’Études des Textiles Anciens (CIETA) in Lyons, France. For examples of how ancient Chinese and other weaves were successfully reproduced, see Becker, J., Pattern and Loom, a Practical Study of the Development of Weaving Techniques in China, Western Asia and Europe (Copenhagen, 1987), 2 volsGoogle Scholar.

14 Kuhn, Dieter, Die Webstühle des Tzu-jen-i-chih aus der Yüan-Zeit (Wiesbaden, 1977), pp. 109–124 Google Scholar.

15 This demanding task, previously performed with the aid of a magnifying glass, is now made much easier and far more accurate with a computer-assisted magnification that can then be projected on a large screen for clear viewing. For more details, see ‘Notes on Textile Terms’ in Sheng, Angela, “The Disappearance of Silk Weaves with Weft-effects in Early China” in Chinese Science 12 (1994–95), pp. 61–65 Google Scholar.

16 Weiji 陈维稷, Chen, Zhongguo fangzhi kexue jishushi 中国纺织科学技术史 [The history of weaving technology in China] (Beijing, 1984), pp. 41–43 Google Scholar.

17 Gu, Ban (32–92 ce), Hanshu 漢書 [History of the Han dynasty] (Beijing, 1975), 24.1117Google Scholar.

18 Xin, Liu (887–946), Jiu Tangshu 舊唐書 [Old Tang history] (Beijing, 1975), 48. 2088Google Scholar.

19 During the time of Three Kingdoms (220–265), Sun Quan 孫權, King of the Wu 吳 kingdom, lamented the lack of a detailed map for working out a strategy to conquer the other two kingdoms of Wei 魏 and Shu 蜀. His wife, Lady Zhao 趙夫人, also sister of Prime Minister Zhao Da 趙達, was noted for her artistic talents. Upon hearing her husband's wish, she painted a landscape showing mountains and lakes. Moreover, she even embroidered a map of five mountains on a square piece silk (fang bo 方帛). For this story, see Chapter 4 of Zhang Yanyuan's 張彥遠 (ca. 825–877), Lidai minghua ji 歷代名畫記 [Records of famous paintings throughout the ages] Huashi congshu 畫史叢書 Vol. 1 (Taipei, 1974), pp. 66–67.

20 Banliang coins were first issued by the Qin state during the Warring States period; they were round coins, cast in bronze with a square hole in the middle and the inscription banliang, which translates as ‘half a [Chinese] ounce’. One pre-Han foot measured about 22.5 cm ( Tamaki 小川環樹, Ogawa et al., Shinjien 新字源 [A new source of characters] (Tokyo, 1987) p. 1225 Google Scholar. See also Shuihudi Qin mo zhujian zu 睡虎地秦墓竹簡整理小組 (ed.), Shuihudi Qin mo zhujian 睡虎地秦墓竹簡 [Bamboo slips from the Qin tomb at Shuihudi] (Beijing, 1990), pp. 35–41, cited in Thierry, François, Monnaies de Chine (Paris, 1997), p. 14 Google Scholar and personal communication with him.

21 Variations of the slanted treadle loom were carved on Han stone slabs to illustrate the Confucian story of Zengzi's 曾子 mother ready to cut the cloth that she was weaving to teach her son a lesson on moral rectitude. Apparently, even when Zengzi's mother heard her son accused of murder three times, she still believed in his innocence ( Wu, Hung, The Wu Liang Shrine: the Ideology of Early Chinese Pictorial Art, Palo Alto, 1989, p. 277 Google Scholar). Nine slabs were found in the modern provinces of Shandong, Jiangsu, and Sichuan. On each slab, the mother is represented as turning away from the loom to lecture a kneeling man. In the one found in Honglou 洪樓 of Tongshan 銅山 county in Jiangsu 江蘇, the mother is shown seated with her feet placed on the two treadles (Chen Weiji 陈维稷, Zhongguo fangzhi kexue jishushi, pp. 198—199, fig. III-5–1–1).

22 Regardless of whether the loom were slanted or horizontal, its width was nearly always the same because it had to be just wide enough for a weaver to easily pass the shuttle with one hand from the right across the loom width and take it out with the left hand from the other side. This resulted in the varying widths of the simple silks and cloths, from 55 cm to 63 cm. However, the length of the warp threads stretched over the horizontal loom could be as long as the horizontal loom was supported and thus, much shorter or usually longer than the length of the warps stretched over the slanted warp frame on a slanted loom.

23 Angela Sheng, “Textile Use, Technology, and Change in Rural Textile Production in Song China (960–1279)” (PhD dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1990), p. 281. One pre-Han foot measured about 22.5 cm ( Tamaki 小川環樹, Ogawa et al., Shinjien 新字源 [A new source of characters] (Tokyo, 1987) p. 1225)Google Scholar.

24 Sheng, “Textile Use, Technology and Change”, Appendix 3.

25 Hanshu, 24.1149. One late-Han foot measured 23.04 cm (Shinjien 新字源 1987, p. 1225).

26 Yue 沈約, Shen, Songshu 宋書 [History of the Liu Song dynasty] (Beijing, 1974) pp. 1559–1560 Google Scholar and Wang, Helen, Money on the Silk Road (London, 2004), p. 14 Google Scholar.

27 Twitchett, Denis, “Codification of the Law” in Twitchett, D. (ed.), The Cambridge History of China, Vol. 3, Sui and Tang, 589–906, Part I (Cambridge, 1989), pp. 414–415 Google Scholar.

28 See Wang Binghua's article in this issue. One Tang foot measured 31.1 cm (Ogawa Tamaki et al., Shinjien 新字源 1987, p. 1226).

29 Du You 杜佑, Tang Liudian 唐六典 (Compendium of administrative law of the six divisions of the Tang bureaucracy) in Shi tong 十通 (Shanghai:Shangwu yinshuguan, 1935–1936), vol.3, p. 33).

30 Working with Dunhuang manuscripts, Éric Trombert discovered, too, that these distinctions were sometimes forgotten so that a bolt of hempen cloth measured more than the official standard length of a duan. In contrast, the measure of duan was shortened for woollens so that a bolt measured less than the official standard length of a duan. See Trombert, E., Le Crédit à Dunhuang (Paris, 1995), pp. 126–127 Google Scholar.

31 Feng 赵丰, Zhao, Sichou yishu shi 絲綢藝術史 [A history of silk art] (Hangzhou, 1992), p. 21 Google Scholar and Sheng, “Textile Use, Technology and Change”, pp. 174–175.

32 Variations of this practice continued to the end of Qing dynasty (1644–1911) and even during the Republican period (1911–1949). Ironically, it was then transmuted into the Communist ‘iron bowl’ until the economic reforms of the 1980s that brought back private property and eroded this security.

33 On the shift from coins to textiles, see Hansheng 全漢昇, Quan Zhongguo jingjishi yanjiu 中國經濟史研究 [Research on the economic history of China] (Jiulong, 1976), Vol. 3, pp. 182–184 Google Scholar. Wang Yichen suggests that crises of inflation were the main cause of the shift from coins; see Yichen 王怡辰, Wang Wei Jin Nanbeichao de huobi jiaoyi he faxing 魏晉南北朝的貨幣交易和發行 [The exchange and distribution of goods and coins during the Wei, Jin and Northern and Southern Dynasties] (Taibei, 2007), pp. 2–5 Google Scholar.

34 Huayu 卢华语, Lu, Tangdai cansang sichou yanjiu 唐代蠶桑絲綢研究 [Research on the sericulture and silk textiles of the Tang dynasty] (Beijing, 1995)Google Scholar and Wang Yichen, Wei Jin Nanbeichao de huobi jiaoyi he faxing.

35 Wang Yichen, Wei Jin Nanbeichao de huobi jiaoyi he faxing, p.104.

36 Plain silk commanded more than twice as much value as hempen cloth in 484 in the Southern Qi state (Nan Qi shu 南齊書 [History of the Southern Qi] (Taipei, 1983), 26.482–83 as cited in Wang Yichen, Wei Jin Nanbeichao de huobi jiaoyi he faxing, p. 105.

37 For an extensive discussion of the categories, see Feng, Zhao 赵丰Tangdai sichou yu sichou zhi lu 唐代絲綢與絲綢之路 [Silks of the Tang dynasty and the Silk Road] (Xi'an, 1992)Google Scholar and Min, Wu 武敏, Zhi xiu. 織繡 [Weaving and embroidery] (Taibei, 1992)Google Scholar.

38 Zhao Feng and Wang Le have also classified the textile specimens in this manner: first by fibre, and second within silk, by monochrome vs. polychrome, and third, within monochrome, by weave structure and then by pattern. This classification privileges the user of a textile but does not reflect the logical considerations from the viewpoint of a textile maker.

39 For simplicity, all jin 錦, meaning polychrome patterned silk weaves, will be translated as brocaded silk, even though the term is not entirely accurate. To brocade is to embellish a textile with pattern while weaving and usually by means of extra or differently coloured weft shot through each shed and not handpicked. For details, see Burnham, Warp and Weft, pp. 14–18.

40 Sheng, A., “Innovations in Textile Techniques on China's Northwest Frontier, 500–700 A.D.”, Asia Major, Third Series, Vol. 2, No. 11 (1998), pp. 117–160 Google Scholar. Zhao Feng has new evidence that weft-faced compound tabby was woven in silk a few centuries earlier in West Asia (presentation at the Silk Trade conference held at Harvard University, 22 April 2012), referring to Matebabayifu, and Feng, Zhao (eds) 马特巴巴伊夫、赵丰, Dayuan yijin – Wuzibiekesitan Feierganna Mengqiatepei chutu de fangzhpiin yanjiu 大宛遗锦——乌兹别克斯坦费尔干纳蒙恰特佩出土的纺织品研究 [Textile manufacture in Ferghana in antiquity and the middle ages] (Shanghai, 2010)Google Scholar.

41 Barber, E. J. W., Prehistoric Textiles, the Development of Cloth in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, with Special Reference to the Aegean (Princeton, 1991), p. 212 Google Scholar.

42 Desrosiers, Sophie, “Une culture textile raffinée”, in Debaine-Francfort, Corinne and Idriss, Abduressul (eds), Keriya, mémoires d'un fleuve: archéologie et civilisation des oasis du Taklamakan, (Paris, 2001) pp. 144–155 Google Scholar; especially p. 151, cat. no. 72.

43 Becker, Pattern and Loom, pp. 22–23. Becker was inspired by Xia Nai's pioneering discussion on this distinction; see “Xinjiang xin faxian de gudai sizhipin—qi, jin he cixiu” 新疆新發現的古代絲織品—綺錦和刺繡 [Newly discovered ancient silks—qi, jin and embroideries], Kaoguxe he kejishi 考古學和科技史 [Archaeology and the history of technology] (Beijing, 1979), pp. 69–97.

44 Zhao Feng has argued that the qi-silks of the Han dynasty (see above) came to be known as ling-silk twills after the Han dynasty; see Zhao Feng, Sichou yishushi, p. 37. However, Wu Min points out that their nomenclature referred to different weave structures in the Tang; see Wu Min, Zhi xiu, pp.134–136. Strictly speaking, silk twills (ling 綾) are silks woven in the twill ground. To distinguish the earlier silks in tabby ground with some handpicked patterns in the twill from the later true silk twills, both Wu and Zhao agree that the earlier qi 綺 of Han dynasty appellation was the same weave as the post-Han appellation of “tabby with twill patterns” (pingwen ling 平紋綾).

45 Zhao Feng, Sichou yishushi, p. 40.

46 Wu Min, Zhi xiu, p. 134, pl. 101. It is now housed in the Museum of the Uyghur Autonomous Region, in Urumqi.

47 The inscription is difficult to read. Wu Min interprets it as “one bolt of chou ling” and the chief accountant as Shi Yu. In contrast, Wang Binghua reads “one bolt of fine ling” and the chief's name as Huo Yu 火愉. Regardless, the word ling is clear to both Wu and Wang and to any reader encountering the inscription for the first time.

48 See tribute dated to year 25 of Kaiyuan Era (737), preserved in the Tang Liudian 唐六典 Siku quanshu edition, 20.6b–7b (Taipei, 1976). See local tribute dated to years 26–29 of the Kaiyuan reign period (738–741) in Yuanhe junxian tuzhi 元和郡縣圖志 [Maps and gazetteer of the provinces and counties in the Yuanhe reign period, 806–814 CE].

49 On the distribution of silk weaves in early Tang, see Yongxing, Wang 王永興, “Shilun Tangdai sizhiye de diqü fenbu” 試論唐代絲織業的地區分布 [A tentative discussion on the distribution of silk weaves in the Tang dynasty] in his Chenmen wenxue gao (Nanchang, 1993), pp. 310–319 Google Scholar.

50 Lu Huayu, Tangdai cansang sichou yanjiu, p. 146.

51 Wu Min, Zhi xiu, pp. 131–133, pl. 98. For its significance, see Sheng, “Innovations”, pp. 158–159 and “Textiles from Astana: Art, Technology, and Social Change”, in Central Asian Textiles and Their Contexts, p. 127.

52 Feng 赵丰, Zhao (ed.), Tangdai sichou yu sichou zhi lu 唐代絲綢與絲綢之路 [Silks of the Tang dynasty and the Silk Road] (Xi'an, 1992), p. 57 Google Scholar, citing Fang 李昉, Li (925–996) et al. (eds), Taiping Guangji 太平廣記 [Extensive records of the Taiping era, 976–983] (Beijing, 1986), 243.1784Google Scholar.

53 Another text indicates that a skilled weaver could produce 9.75 bolts (pi) per month but a novice only 2.25 bolts – that is, nearly three times as much (117 m versus 32 m). For details of both entries, see Zhao Feng, Tangdai sichou yu sichou zhi lu, p. 19.

54 Lacking sources for the Tang period, let us consult a local gazetteer in the Song that provided information on how labour-intensive and time-consuming it was to weave luo 羅 silk gauze. It took a skilled artisan working in an imperial manufacture at Runzhou 潤州 (today's Zhenjiang in Jiangsu) 12 days to weave one bolt of luo-silk (12 m). In other words, a skilled luo-weaver could only weave 1 m of silk gauze per day, one-ninth of what the skilled juan-weaver could produce in a day. Sheng, “Textile Use, Technology, and Change”, p. 61.

55 Ikeda On's 池田溫 thorough analysis of Turfan documents gives prices for all kinds of commodities in Jiaohe in 743 but not those of complex weaves. Ikeda On first published in 1968 his scrupulous reconstruction of textual fragments brought back by Ōtani to Japan that he then revised in his Chūgoku kodai sekichō kenkyū 中國古代籍帳研究 [Studies in ancient Chinese household registers] (Tokyo, 1979, pp. 447–62). This research was published in Chinese with additional fragments found in Lüshun 旅順, China, as “Zhongguo gudai wujia chutan, guanyu Tianbao 2 nian Jiaohejun shigu'an duanpian” 中國古代物價初探,關於天寶 2 年交河郡市估案斷片[Initial investigation of early Chinese commodity prices based on fragments of a Jiaohe document on market estimates dated year 2 of Tianbao era] in his Tangdai yanjiu lunwen xuanji 唐代研究論文選集 [Selected essays of research on Tang dynasty] (Beijing, 1999), pp. 122–89. This price register has also been translated into French, see Trombert, E. and de la Vaissière, É., “Le prix des denrées sur le marché de Turfan en 743” in Études de Dunhuang et Turfan, textes réunis par Jean-Pièrre Drège avec la collaboration d'Olivier Venture (Paris, Droz, 2007), pp. 1–52 Google Scholar.

56 古代织绫名。《云仙杂记》 引 《摭拾精华》 ： ‘邺中老母村人织绫， 必三交五结， 号八梭绫， 匹直米五筐’, cited in Chen Weiji, Zhongguo fangzhi kexue jishushi, p. 319.

57 Ao 李翱, Li, Quan Tangwen 全唐文 [Complete Writings of the Tang] (Beijing, 1983)Google Scholar, 634.6403 cited in Lu Huayu, Tangdai cansang sichou yanjiu, p.154 and note 64.

58 These are listed in Yuanhe junxian tuzhi.

59 For numerous citations, see Lu Huayu, Tangdai cansang sichou yanjiu, pp. 124–139 and Zhao Feng. Tangdai sichou yu sichou zhi lu, pp. 97–121.

60 E. Trombert, Le Crédit à Dunhuang, pp. 110–112.

61 E. Trombert, Le Crédit à Dunhuang, p. 112.

62 These had been centres of silk production since 1000 BCE. Kuhn, Dieter, “Silk Weaving in Ancient China: From Geometric Figures to Patterns of Pictorial Likeness”, Chinese Science 12 (1995), pp. 80–81 Google Scholar.

63 Wang Yongxing, “Shilun Tangdai sizhiye de diqu fenbu”, pp. 325–327.

64 This fragment was collected by Marc Aurel Stein (hence the prefix MAS), and is in the British Museum.

65 However, this is an extremely detailed design, and to create the same peacock in a gauze weave would have required technological advances on the gauze loom (luoji 羅機). For a comprehensive discussion of this loom, see Kuhn, Dieter, Die Webstűhle des Tzu-jen i-chih aus der Yuan-Zeit, Sinologica Coloniensia 5 (Wiesbaden, 1977)Google Scholar; Zhao Feng, Sichou yishu shi, pp. 2021. If so, this textual reference would push back the innovation to the tenth century from the mid-twelfth century, that is, after 1127 when the Song court moved south to Hangzhou and boosted the popularity of silk gauze weaves. Material evidence of complex silk gauzes woven with curvilinear and stylized flora was unearthed in 1975 from the tomb of Huang Sheng 黃昇 in Fuzhou, dating to the time of this woman's death in 1243 at age 17, one year after her marriage to Zhao, Yujun 趙與駿, a minor official and a distant relation to the ruling imperial family (Fuzhou sheng bowuguan (ed.) 福建省博物馆, Fuzhou Nan Song Huang Sheng mu 福州南宋黄昇墓 [The tomb of Huang Sheng of the Southern Song in Fuzhou] (Beijing, 1982), English summary, pp. 1–3 Google Scholar.

66 E. Trombert, Le Crédit à Dunhuang, pp. 117–118.

67 For a reference to the Persian jin, see it listed in a clothing inventory, 64TAM15:6 (Tulufan chutu wenshu 4: 31–33); for a reference to the tree-leaf jin, see Turfan Document #38, 60TAM 326:014 (Yamamoto and Ikeda 1987,Vol. III, No. 15 (205); and for references to location-specific jin, see Turfan Documents 75TKM90: 20, 75TKM88: 1(b) and 75 TKM99: 6 (b) (Tulufan chuty wenshu, Beijing, Vol. II, p. 18; and Vol. I, pp. 189 and 191).

68 Walters, Roy H. and Hougen, O. A., “Silk Degumming: I. Degradation of Silk Sericin by Alkalies”, Textile Research Journal Vol. 5, No. 2 (1934), pp. 92–104 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

69 It was probably composed sometime in 300 BCE. Renjun 聞人軍, Wen (annotated), Kaogongji yizhu 考工記譯註 [Annotation on the record of surveying crafts] (Shanghai, 1993), p. 57 Google Scholar.

70 Qiyu, Miao (ed. and annotated), Qimin yaoshu jiaoyi 齊民要術 [Important arts of for the people's welfare) (Beijing, 1982), p. 164 Google Scholar.

71 Trombert, Éric, “Des fleurs rouges en galette: une plante tinctoriale dans la chine ancienne: le carthame”, Journal Asiatique Vol. 285, No. 2 (1997), pp. 509–547 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

72 Miao Qiyu, pp. 262–274.

73 Silu kaogu zhenpin 絲路考古珍品 [Archaeological treasures of the Silk Road in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region] (Shanghai, 1998), cat. nos 98 and 100. The rider figurine, measuring 46 cm high, was excavated from Astana Tomb No. 187 in 1972, and the dancer figurine, measuring 31 cm high, was excavated from Astana Tomb No. 206 in 1973.

74 Sichou zhilu Han Tang zhiwu 絲綢之路漢唐織物 [Silk Road textiles of the Han and Tang dynasties] (Beijing, 1973), cat. no. 40 (two silk fragments) and cat. no. 61 (hemp tax cloth). For the latter, see Wang Binghua's article in this issue.

75 Sichou zhilu, Han Tang zhiwu, cat. no. 20.

76 Her tomb is no. 206. Western Imprints, pp. 94–97, see Figs 2–5, a, b, c; see Feng, Zhao 赵丰, Wang Hui 王辉 and Wan Fang 万芳, “Gansu Huahai Huajiatan 26 hao mu chutu de sichou fushi” 甘肃花海毕家滩 26 号墓出土的丝绸服饰 [Silk clothing unearthed in Tomb no. 26 at Hujiatan, Huahai, in Gansu province], in Xibei fengge – HanJin zhiwu 西北风格——汉晋织物 [Style of the north-west – Han to Jin weaves] (Hong Kong, 2008), pp. 84–113 Google Scholar.

77 Yuanhe junxian tuzhi 2.590.

78 Sichou zhilu, cat. no. 41.

79 Wu Min, Zhi xiu, col. pls. 99, 100, 103, and 106.

80 Wu Min, Zhi xiu, col. pl. 107, Astana Tomb No. 191.

81 Wu Min, Zhi xiu, col. pls. 109, 110, 111 (sha), 116, 117, 118, 119, 120.

82 See fn. 55.

Zhao Feng compared the textile prices with those listed in a contemporaneous military record found in Dunhuang (P3348), dated to year 4 of Tianbao (745) in Tangdai sichou yu sichou zhilu, p. 199.

83 Ikeda On, “Zhongguo gudai wujian chutan”, pp. 127, lines 29–36.

84 Ikeda On, “Zhongguo gudai wujian chutan”, pp. 127–128.

85 Knauer, E. R., “A Man's Caftan and Leggings from the North Caucasus of the Eighth to the Tenth Century: A Genealogical Study”, Metropolitan Museum Journal Vol. 36 (2001), p. 137 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.