LL-L "Music" 2009.03.08 (03) [E/German]

[Lowlands-L List]

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L O W L A N D S - L - 08 March 2009 - Volume 03
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From: Hellinckx Luc <luc.hellinckx at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Music"

Beste Paul,

Given that you could walk or ride from the Atlantic to the Pacific without
getting your (or your horse's) feet wet, the continuity of various cultural
and technological items perhaps isn't too surprising.

OK, you'd possibly starve, freeze, die of thirst or heatstroke, or get
killed by bandits. But you wouldn't have to get your feet wet.

Paul

Derby
England

(Without a plane or a boat, you can't get here without getting your feet
wet)

Mmm...I doubt your feet would get wet if you'd take the Channel Tunel.
Whether your horse would be allowed on the Eurostar remains to be seen
however *s*.

Kind greetings,

Luc Hellinckx

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From: Mike Morgan <mwmosaka at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Music" 2009.03.08 (01) [E/German]

Paul wrote:

Given that you could walk or ride from the Atlantic to the Pacific without
getting your (or your horse's) feet wet

Hmmmm, I'm trying to think ... IS there a route you can take which doesn't
have to cross a major river here or there? I'm not an EXPERT on geography,
but can't think of one. (Although I HAVE walked across a major river without
getting my KNEES wet ... and without benefit of bridges ... Central Gangetic
Plain's dry season changes that geography completely!)

U C > || mwm
================
Dr Michael W Morgan
Ishara Foundation || ईशारा फॉउंडेशन  || イシャラ基金
Mumbai/Bombay *|* मुंबई *|* ムンバイ/ボンベイ (インド)
www.ishara.org
+++++++++++++++
Wer fremde Sprachen nicht kennt, weiß nichts von seiner eigenen. (Johann
Wolfgang von Goethe)

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From: Paul Finlow-Bates <wolf_thunder51 at yahoo.co.uk>
Subject: LL-L "Music" 2009.03.08 (01) [E/German]

From: R. F. Hahn
<sassisch at yahoo.com<http://uk.mc264.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=sassisch@yahoo.com>>

Subject: Music

Paul, the Silk Road existed even longer than most people used to think.
Trading tended to be in stages, but some people did make it all the way
across Eurasia, and Marco Polo wasn't the first.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron
Seattle, USA

Hi Ron,

I've read references to Romans communicating with Chinese writers, using
Persian as the common language.  I don't know how true that is, but it seems
possible, even probable.  The letters probably took months, even years, but
that was common even to living memory times.  We expect instant responses,
but that's part of our conditioning.

Paul
Derby

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From: R. F. Hahn
<sassisch at yahoo.com<http://uk.mc264.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=sassisch@yahoo.com>>

Subject: Music

Paul,

I'm not so sure about Persian as a lingua franca, but it is true that
Persians (and throw in some Near Easterners and some Turkic people) were *
the* link trading in both the West and the East. Many of them, together with
Syrians and others, took Christianity (Nestorian and otherwise) to China at
the latest during the Tang Dynasty (唐朝, 618-907 CE), having at least one
Christian church in the Tang capital Chang'an (長安, today's Xi'an 西安). It was
located in a permanent foreign enclave that apparently was mostly Persian
speaking, but Syriac (a form of Aramaic) was also used.

At or soon after the fall of the Tang, Near Eastern and Persian Jews began
to appear in China, apparently both by sea and via the Silk Road. And at the
same time large numbers of Muslims entered China. They converted many
Chinese and intermingled with them (the Islamic, Chinese-speaking Hui/Dungan
now being China's largest minority) and since that time China's Muslims have
been in close contact with the Near East, Persia and Central Asia.

Buddhist foreigners seem to have been particularly numerous at that time,
and these were Persians (mostly from what is now Afghanistan), South Asians
as well as the Tocharians of Xinjiang's Tarim Basin, all of them speakers of
Indo-European languages. There are rumors or vague indications that
Europeans, too, visited or lived in China during the Tang dynasty, and
references to apparently blond dancers can be found at the latest in the
Southern Song dynasty (南宋, 1127–1279).

The predominantly Buddhist kingdom of Gandhara (*Gand**ḥ**āra, *गन्धार,
ګندهارا, in what is now Afghanistan's Kandahār کندهار ~ Qandahār
قندهار province)
was a meeting place of Eastern and Western trade, cultures, arts and
thoughts. You will find Greek and Chinese elements there, to mention but
two. The kingdom lasted from the 6th century BCE to the 11th century CE. (It
is its Buddhist artifacts that the Taliban are bent on destroying.)

Indirect trade across Eurasia started much earlier. While China tried to
pacify the "barbarians" by either fighting them (and keeping them out) or by
integrating (and hopefully absorbing) them, for a while they were extremely
dependent on some of the goodies the "barbarians" had to offer. First and
foremost among these were horses and equestrian skills of various sorts, a
commodity known as both Central Asian and Indo-European. Two of the most
important goods China had to offer in return were silk and porcelain.

There is hardly any Chinese musical instrument that can be successfully
argued to be Chinese inventions. The *guqin* (古琴
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guqin) zither may have started in China before
being adapted in Korea and Japan and elsewhere. Most instruments are clearly
of Persian and Central Asian origin, instruments that eventually made their
way to India, the Middle East and Europe as well.

Marco Polo supposedly discovered China during the Mongol or Yuan dynasty (元朝
1271-1368).

The earliest known descriptions of the pre-Christian Slavic cultures along
the southern Baltic Sea coast are written in Arabic, and bunches of ancient
Arabic coins have been unearthed in that area.

I'm trying to make a point here, but maybe I'm belaboring it by now.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron
Seattle, USA

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From:Hannelore Hinz  <HanneHinz at t-online.de>
Subject: LL-L "Music" 2009.03.07 (04) [E]

Liebe Lowlanders,

hier noch ein Nachklang  vom bemerkenswerten Treffen der Dudelsackspieler im
Freilichtmuseum Schwerin.

http://www.absolut-mecklenburg.eu/root/portal/index.php?seite=496&to_print=1

http://www.pipenunlyren.de

http://www.schwerin.de/freilichtmuseum

Beste Grüße.

Hanne

•

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