The Silk Road is an extensive interconnected network of trade routes across the Asian continent connecting East, South, and Western Asia with the Mediterranean world, as well as North and Northeast Africa and Europe. The term "Seidenstraße...

The Achaemenid Empire (c. 550–330 B.C.E.), known as the Persian Empire, was the successor state of the Median Empire, expanding to eventually rule over significant portions of the ancient world which at around 500 B.C.E. stretched from the...

Emperor Wu of Han was the seventh emperor of the Han dynasty of China, ruling from 141–87 BC. He is one of the most famous emperors of ancient China. Emperor Wu's reign lasted 54 years — a record that was not broken until the reign of th...

Zhang Qian (d. 113 BC) was a Chinese official and diplomat who served as an imperial envoy to the world outside of China in the 2nd century BC, during the time of the Han dynasty. He was the first official diplomat to bring back reliable in...

Attila the Hun was the Emperor of the Huns from 434 until his death in 453. He was leader of the Hunnic Empire which stretched from Germany to the Ural River and from the River Danube to the Baltic Sea. During his rule, he was one of the mo...

Alp Arslan was the second Sultan of the Seljuq Empire and great-grandson of Seljuq, the eponymous founder of the dynasty. His real name was Muhammad bin Dawud Chaghri, and for his military prowess, personal valour, and fighting skills he ob...

Genghis Khan was the founder and Great Khan (emperor) of the Mongol Empire, which became the largest contiguous empire in history after his demise. He came to power by uniting many of the nomadic tribes of northeast Asia. After founding...

Kublai Khan was the fifth Khagan (Great Khan) of the Ikh Mongol Uls (Mongol Empire), reigning from 1260 to 1294, and the founder of the Yuan Dynasty, a division of the Mongol Empire. Kublai was the fourth son of Tolui and a grandson of G...

Marco Polo was a Christian merchant from the Venetian Republic whose travels are recorded in Il Milione, a book which did much to introduce Europeans to Central Asia and China. He learned about trading whilst his father and uncle, Niccolò a...

Timur meaning "iron" or Tamerlane in English, was a 14th-century conqueror of much of western and central Asia, founder of the Timurid Empire and Timurid dynasty (1370–1405) in Central Asia, and great great grandfather of Babur, the founder...

Baron (Nils) Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld also known as A. E. Nordenskioeld was a Finnish-Swede geologist, mineralogist and arctic explorer, and a member of the prominent Finland-Swedish Nordenskiöld family of scientists. Born in the Grand Duchy...

Ferdinand Freiherr von Richthofen was a German traveller, geographer, and scientist. He traveled or studied in the Alps of Tyrol and the Carpathians in Transylvania. In 1860, he joined the Eulenburg Expedition, a Prussian expedition which...

Nikolai Mikhaylovich Przhevalsky also transliterated Przewalski, was a Russian geographer of Polish origin and explorer of Central and Eastern Asia. Although he never reached his final goal, Lhasa in Tibet, he travelled through regions unk...

Sir Marc Aurel Stein KCIE, FBA, was a Hungarian archaeologist, mainly concerned with exploring ancient Central Asia. He was also a professor at various Indian universities. Stein was influenced by Sven Hedin's 1898 work, Through Asia. He m...

Lieutenant Colonel Sir Francis Edward Younghusband, KCSI, KCIE, was a British Army officer, explorer, and spiritual writer. He is remembered chiefly for his travels in the Far East and Central Asia; especially the 1904 British expedition to...