Strategy Page looks at some recent archaeological and DNA study results that are not popular with China’s government:
Chinese scientists, conducting genetic research in western China, recently tested the people in an ancient, and remote, village, and found that the DNA of the villagers was 56 percent Caucasian (Indo-European). The current theory is that these people are descendants of Roman soldiers who were long rumored to have established an outpost on this eastern end of the ancient Silk Road (the caravan route from China to the Middle East.) The Chinese are not happy with findings like this.
The Chinese government has long been uneasy about archeologists and anthropologists finding evidence of European peoples living, and settling, in western China thousands of years ago. The Chinese have a high opinion of themselves (often justified), but because of the European role in humiliating China in the 18th and 19th centuries, they are uncomfortable with the idea that the damn Europeans have been in their neighborhood even earlier. Earlier discoveries included very old (more than 3,000 years ago) burial sites containing tall, blonde, warriors. There was also a village of ancient Jews in western China, where the people had only stopped practicing Jewish religious rituals in the last century.
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The Chinese may be unhappy simply because they have to give the “northern barbarians” credit for driving the Indo-Aryan tribes away, rather than letting Chinese soldiers do it. Thus it’s currently a big deal in China anytime Chinese technology, or diplomats, beats the Westerners. In the Chinese universe, it’s the supreme insult for foreigners to best the Chinese, militarily or otherwise. But for the last few centuries, that is what happened. China isn’t really looking for a war with the West, but politicians find it easy to win approval by playing up the might of the motherland, and what China can do (in theory) if anyone messes with us. That process induces some amnesia about what has really happened in the past, but that’s what nationalism and demagoguery are all about.
The traditional theory proposed in the 17th century by is that China is derived from Qin Chin the westernmost of the Chinese kingdoms during the or from the succeeding 221 206 BC . The use of Zh nggu implied a claim of political legitimacy and Zh nggu was often used by states who saw themselves as the sole legitimate successor to previous Chinese dynasties for example in the era of the both the and the Southern Song state claimed to be Zh nggu . Chinese civilization was also one of the few to invent the others being the the and other civilizations the of ancient and .
Comment by www.monex.com — December 20, 2010 @ 09:46