Roman gold coin recently unearthed in Dulan County, in Northwest China's Qinghai Province, may shed new light on the history of East-West trade routes.

The discovery, along with other archaeological findings, indicates that the ancient Silk Road's Qinghai section may have been one of the busiest caravan routes used by merchants travelling between China and the Middle East.

Xu Xinguo, head of the Qinghai Cultural Relics and Archaeology Institution, said that the coin excavated from a tomb in Xiangride township in Dulan County was identified as having been made during the reign of Roman Emperor Theodosius II (AD 408-450).

Experts said that the 2.36-gram coin, with a diameter of 14.5 millimetres, may have been used as an ornament.

The tomb was for a man from Tubo, the ancient name for Tibet, who lived during the Northern Dynasty (AD 386-581). It was the second ancient Roman gold coin unearthed in Dulan.

As well as the gold coin, scores of silver artefacts and more than 350 silk items in 130 categories have been unearthed from tombs along the Qinghai section, said Xu.

Sites where coins are found usually indicate trade and traffic routes, so Xu said that archaeologists should think again about the eastern section of the Silk Road.

A widely accepted theory is that the road entered today's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region through Lanzhou and the Gansu Corridor.

But Xu said that a number of recent archaeological findings from Tubo tombs, including this coin, have shifted people's attention to Dulan County deep in the Qaidam Basin.

He said he believed that the Dulan region occupied a very important position in East-West traffic during the early to mid-fifth century.

Lin Meicun, an archaeologist with Peking University, said that the latest discovery of the Roman gold coin provides more convincing evidence of past prosperity.

After inspecting the cultural relics unearthed from the Tubo tombs in Dulan, Lin said he now believes that the Qinghai section began to prosper around the time of the Southern and Northern Dynasties (AD386-589) and entered its heyday during the Tang Dynasty (AD 618-907).

( China Daily July 11, 2002)