Xu Xinguo, head of the Qinghai Cultural Relics and Archeology Institution, said that the coin excavated from a tomb in Xiangride Township in Dulan County was made during the reign of Theodosius II (408-450AD).

The tomb was for an ethnic Tubo who lived in the Northern Dynasties (386-550 AD). This is the second ancient Roman gold coin unearthed in Dulan.

As sites where coins are found usually indicate then trade and traffic routes, Xu says that archeologists should think again about the east end of the "Silk Road."

A widely accepted theory is that the road entered the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region through present-day Lanzhou and the Gansu Corridor.

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

He believed that the Dulan region occupied a very important position for East-West traffic during the early and middle fifth century.

And the route from Xining to Xinjiang through the Qaidam Basin, slightly to the south, may be equally important, he said.

Before sea routes opened between the East and the West, the Silk Road was the land corridor linking China with Central and Western Asia to the eastern shore of the Mediterranean between 100BC and 800 AD.

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

(Xinhua News Agency July 3, 2002)