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Course Description

Summary

n this course, we examine six moments of intellectual encounter between "east" and "west" along the storied routes of the Silk Road.  These encounters spanned a millennium, from the fifth century BCE to the fourteenth century.  We will be reading travel narratives written by these adventurers – Herodotus, Xuan Zang, Al-Biruni, Marco Polo, Ibn Battuta, and Sir John Mandeville – and considering them as historical sources.  Proceeding chronologically, we witness encounters between vastly different intellectual, scientific, cultural, and religious traditions, and consider the ways in which critical thinkers in the past analyzed the wonderful strangeness of their world.