History — or , rather , our present - day find of history — is full of surprises . Take the Silk Road , for example . The commerce and ethnic exchange facilitated by the legendary trade wind internet were staggeringly influential in the advance of civilization from the Pacific to the Mediterranean . Maps of the routes are well establish , yet archaeologists say they may have plant a new arrest , eminent in the Himalayas . Their report was publish in the journalScience and Technology of Archaeological Research .
The researchers had n’t started out looking for Silk Road artifact . AnthropologistMark Aldenderferhad been excavate a serial of 10 shaft tomb in the Nepali village of Samdzong . The tomb had been buried for centuries and were only revealed in 2009 when a seismal event break off the front of the cliff in which they were hidden . So far , the tomb have yielded the lovingly shrine remains of more than 100 people .
Aldenderfer discover the surprising artifacts in a grave known as Samdzong 5 , which contained only two bodies : one adult and one child . These dead body had been laid to rest in sumptuousness , surrounded by wooden , bronze , copper , and glass cups , trays , jewellery , and beads . One of the most interesting item was a mask of gold and flatware ( shown above ) , which the researchers believe likely covered the grownup ’s face . The edges of the masquerade were perforate , suggest it had once been sewn to cloth .
Margarita Gleba
Cloth is a tricky affair . Unlike metallic element , glass , or stone , it degrades relatively quickly under normal conditions , so archaeologist do n’t often recover textiles . But Samdzong 5 was litter with fleck of silk fabric , thanks to the dry climate and mellow elevation ( more than 13,000 feet above ocean stratum ) .
What ’s more , those fight were n’t local . “ There is no evidence for local silk production , ” lead writer Margarita Glebasaidin a press program line , “ suggest that Samdzong was put in into the long - distance trade meshing of the Silk Road . "
All of the object feel in the tomb underwent chemical substance analysis . premature researchers had examined the cups , jewellery , and bead in previous studies and resolve that they ’d been produced elsewhere , in places like India and Sri Lanka , or down on the Tibetan tableland .
The late subject area took a closer aspect at the scraps of silk using scanning electron microscopes ( for tops skinny - up imagination of the fiber ) , fluid chromatography to try the dye , and micro - Raman spectrometry to name any pigments . The tests revealed that the silk , too , was the mathematical product of trade , with components from both local and far - flung sources .
" The data reward the belief that instead of being isolated and outback , Upper Mustang was once a small , but crucial node of a much big net of people and places , ” Gleba said . " These textiles can further our intellect of the local cloth materials and technique , as well as the chemical mechanism through which various community developed and adapted new material engineering to fit local cultural and stinting motive . "
