Ankit Negi

11th s b
09

The Silk ROAD

By Nick Middleton

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 Index

About Character
Author Sketch

Summary Silk Road

Mount Lake
Kailash Mansarovar

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Nick Middleton (born 1960) is a British physical geographer and
supernumerary fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford. He
specialises in desertification.
Middleton was born in London, England. As a geographer, he
has travelled to more than 70 countries. In Going to Extremes, a
Channel 4 television programme about extreme lifestyles, he
experienced life in the hostile conditions that other cultures must
endure. Part of his Book Silk Road is included in the NCERT's
class 11 textbook.
He won the Royal Geographical Society's Ness Award in 2002.
He has appeared on BBC 2's Through the Keyhole.

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CHARACTER SKETCH OF ‘SILK ROAD’

Nick Middleton

• Author. He is adventerous and at the same time

considers the travel a chance to research on
various topics like alititude and its affects on
human body. He describes the journey and the
hardships faced on the Silk Road.

Tsetan
• He was a driver hired by the author. He was a very
good and efficient driver. He drove the car very
carefully considering the safety of the passengers.
During the journey, he spoke to the author and
gave important details of the places they were
passing by. When he found the author was not
well, he took him to Medical College and cared for
his health. He was a good Buddhist and believed
that death is not the end of life.

Daniel

• Author’s friend who accompanied him on the

journey to Mount Kailash.

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SUMMARY
Silk Road is an extract from a travelogue written by Nick
Middleton. The author describes his pilgrimage to Mount Kailash.
As the narrator starts from Ravu towards Kailash to perform
Kora. He wants to be more adventurous than to be religious. The
Silk Road was the main trade route between Kashmir to China.
Silk was one of the main commodities that were traded in those
area. It was early morning when the author left Ravu with his
companions Daniel and Tsetan. Tsetan, the driver of his vehicle,
knew the short cut route to Mount Kailash.On the way they met
solitary drokbas tending their flocks and also the dark tents of the
nomads. Giant Tibetan mastiffs would chase the author’s car for
a hundred metres or so. They could see snow-capped mountains
far away. After a while Tsetan had to stop the car because of
snow. They flung dust on the snow-capped route to ease the car.
There was another blockage after about ten minutes. At the
height of 5515 metres they took a turn round the cairn of rocks.
By late afternoon they had reached the small town of Hor from
where Daniel left for Lhasa. Hor seemed a grim place even
though it was on the shore of Lake Manasarovar, the most
venerated stretch of water. The author was eager to forge ahead
towards Mount Kailash. They reached Darchen at night. The
author had to pass a troublesome night in Darchen. In the
morning Tsetan took him to Darchen Medical College. The
Tibetan doctor gave him some medicine and assured him that he
would be able to do the Kora. Tsetan went back leaving the
author alone after his recovery. Author was worried because
there were no pilgrims at Darchen. He couldn’t find any person
who speaks enough English to answer his questions. He met
Norbu in Darchen’s only café. The author was happy to find his
company. He decided that Norbu would turn out to be the ideal
companion.

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 Silk Road
The Silk Road was a network of Eurasian trade routes active
from the second century BCE until the mid-15th century
Spanning over 6,400 kilometres (4,000 miles), it played a central
role in facilitating economic, cultural, political, and religious
interactions between the East and West The name "Silk Road",
first coined in the late 19th century, has fallen into disuse among
some modern historians in favour of Silk Routes, which more
accurately describes the intricate web of land and sea routes
connecting East and Southeast Asia, the Indian subcontinent,
Central Asia, the Middle East, East Africa and Europe.

During its roughly 1,500 years of existence, the Silk Road

endured the rise and fall of numerous empires and major
calamities such as the Black Death and the Mongol conquests;
after almost every disruption, the network re-emerged stronger

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than before, The Silk Road trade played a significant role in
opening political and economic relations between China, Korea,
Japan, India, Iran, Europe, the Horn of Africa and Arabia.

Despite repeatedly surviving many geopolitical changes and

disruptions, the Silk Road abruptly ended with the rise of the
Ottoman Empire in 1453, which almost immediately severed
trade between East and West.

In June 2014, UNESCO designated the Chang'an-Tianshan

corridor of the Silk Road as a World Heritage Site, while the
Indian portion remains on the tentative site list.

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 Mount Kailash
Mount Kailash is a mountain in the Ngari Prefecture, Tibet
Autonomous Region of China. It has an altitude of 6,714 m
(22,028 ft).

It lies in the Kailash Range of the Transhimalaya, in the western

part of the Tibetan Plateau. Mount Kailash is less than 100 km
towards the north from the western trijunction of the borders of
China, India, and Nepal.

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Mount Kailash is located close to Lake Manasarovar and Lake
Rakshastal. The sources of four major Asian rivers lie close to
this mountain and the two lakes. These rivers are the Indus,
the Sutlej, the Brahmaputra, and the Karnali.

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 Lake Mansarovar
Lake Mansarovar is a high altitude freshwater lake fed by the
Kailash Glaciersnear Mount Kailash

It is located about 50 kilometers to the northwest of Nepal, about

100 kilometers east of Uttarakhand, and in the southwest region
of Tibet. The lake lies at 4,590 m (15,060 ft) above mean sea
level, a relatively high elevation for a large freshwater lake on the
mostly saline lake-studded Tibetan Plateau. According to
Brockman, it is one of the highest freshwater lakes in Asia.

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Lake Mansarovar is relatively round in shape with the
circumference of 88 km (54.7 mi). Its depth reaches a maximum
of 90 m (300 ft.) and its surface area is 320 km2 (123.6 sq. mi).

In the chapter it is also mentioned that Ekai Kawaguchi, a

Japanese monk who had arrived there 1900, was so moved by
that sanctity of the lake that he burst into tears. The hallowed
waters had a similar effect on Sven Hedin, a who wasn’t prone to
sentimental outbursts.

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