Survey Expeditions to Western China

Summary

This book project is concerned with the fieldwork geographers conducted between the two world wars, and the ways in which the humanities and geosciences have contributed to the study of China and Central Asia. To comprehend how scholars have influenced the development of theories on¸ Sthe geographical pivot of history,ˇT we will propose an account of a remarkable expedition that explored the Gobi desert. The environment of the Gobi, the second largest desert in the world, has changed so dramatically since the Cretaceous period that the previously subtropical region is now experiencing the most continental climate in the Old World. Formed in this region every spring, giant sandstorms hit northern China and close the airports of Korea and Japan. Dust from the dry lakes of Edsin-gol even color the Californian sky. What NASA has called the most degraded landscape on Earth used to be the natural environment of the flourishing oases of the Silk Road. Agriculture was practiced there 2000 years ago but mysteriously disappeared after the 15th century. Mapping what happened to the oases, rivers and terminal lakes at the foot of the snow-clad Qilianshan Mountains would help understand how local communities adjusted to life-threatening changes.

Still in progress, this challenging task began in the 1920s when Swedish, German and Chinese scientists decided to jointly establish a network of meteorological bases. The first station opened in the oasis of Edsin-gol (today Ejin qi, Inner Mongolia), in 1927. Until 1935, a team of archaeologists, meteorologists, and geologists painfully collected evidence on the past landscape. They documented the rapid and catastrophic climate changes that occurred centuries ago but failed to explain these events. After we review their precise field maps and detailed reports, we should be able to reconstruct not only the environmental and cultural history of the region since 100 AD,
but also the scholarly debate on climate and race that occurred during the interwar years. We will very specifically investigate the SSE Reports on the ancient city of Kara-khoto and the Edsin-gol delta because we believe these publications exemplify the methodological approach followed during the interwar years to analyze ¸Sman and natureˇT interactions. We will indeed argue that the Sino-Swedish¸ SScientific Expedition to the North-western Provinces of ChinaˇT (SSE) provides a useful framework to analyze the relationship between mapmaking and the study of the historical landscape.

This project will thus complement those initiated by Professor Gu Weizu of the Nanjing Institute of Hydrology, the Earthwatch expeditions of London, and the Research Team of the Oases Project that belongs to the Research Institute for Humanity and Nature of Kyoto. The International Centre for Chinese Heritage and Archaeology (London and Beijing) has decided to sponsor this project because it promotes exchanges between the scholars of Europe and China. The Gerda Henkel Foundation is providing 18 months of financial support. The project leader will be a Fellow of the Swedish Collegium during the 2007-2008 academic year. Housed at the Institute of Cartography of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology at Zurich, the project is placed under Professor Lorenz Hurni's supervision.

Project period

01.06.2006 – ?

Researchers

Lead: Hurni, Lorenz
Internal:

Funding sources

Foundations

Partner

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Web

www.scasss.uu.se
www.gerda-henkel-stiftung.de
www.fieldstudies.dk

Publications

Millward, James A.; Dunnell, Ruth W.; Elliott, Mark C.; Fôret, Philippe. 2004-01-01. New Qing Imperial History, The Making of Inner Asian Empire at Qing Chengde. RoutledgeCurzon, London, RoutledgeCurzon.

Forêt, Philippe. 2004. La véritable histoire d’une montagne plus grande que l’Himalaya, Les résultats scientifiques inattendus d’un voyage au Tibet. Paris, Editions Bréal.

Forêt, Philippe. 2000. Mapping Chengde, The Qing Landscape Enterprise. Honolulu, University of Hawai’i Press.

Forêt, Philippe; Baud, Aymon; Gorshenina, Svetlana. 2003. La Haute-Asie telle qu’ils l’ont vue, Explorateurs et scientifiques de 1820 à 1940. Genève, Editions Olizane.