The Silk Road (Natural History Museum)

Dhr. Seven, Amber Larson, Wisdom Quarterly; Natural History Museum (nhm.org)

Exploring the Silk Road

Tour the Silk Road (nhm.org)

Take a journey exploring the traded goods and ideas of the world’s cultural superhighway -- one that took Buddhism out of India (Gandhara and Magadha) into Central Asia (Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, the other 'Stans), ancient Greece (Bactria/Persia, Sogdiana, and the greater empire), and finally into China. Join the Natural History Museum for the Traveling the Silk Road Lecture Series to experience the sights, sounds, and tastes of the ancient route! More

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  Old Buddhism in Uzbekistan, new Googoosha

  Bactria - Ancient History Encyclopedia
• The Sogdians in China: A Short History
• Sogdiana - Ancient History Encyclopedia
• BBC: Popstar President Googoosha a.ka. Gulnara Karimova: Corruption in Uzbekistan (Central Asia's largest country, near Afghanistan)
• Monks' Footsteps: Uzbek Buddhist monuments
• USA/NSA "collected 200 million texts per day"
• Actress sues over French Pres. Hollande's "affair"
• Taliban [CIA] to return to power [to keep Afghan War going]
• UN confronts Vatican on its child molestation

Historical Sketch of Buddhism in Western Asia

(BerzinArchives.com) Historically, Buddhism was found in all five former Soviet Central Asian Republics that constitute West Turkistan: Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan [and, of course, Afghanistan, which the former USSR failed to conquer]. It initially spread in the first century BCE from Gandhara (Indo-Pakistan) and Afghanistan to the kingdoms of Bactria and Parthia [The remains of two Parthian Buddhist monuments each have been found in Turkmenistan at Mary (Merv) and near Ashkabat; Buddhist caves have also been found near Ashkabat]. Turkmenistan and northeastern Iran constituted the kingdom of Parthia; while southern Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and northern Afghanistan constituted the kingdom of Bactria [The remains of Bactrian Buddhist monasteries have been found near Termez in southern Uzbekistan at Kara Tepe, Fayas Tepe and Dalverzin Tepe, and the remains of a reliquary at Zormala and of Buddhist wall murals at Balalyk Tepe, both in the Surkhan Darya region. Remains of a Buddhist monastery have been excavated at Ajina Tepe in southern Tajikistan.]