Question: What city on the Silk Road means "Sandy place" in Persian?
Context: Jaisalmer Fort is one of the largest fully preserved fortified cities in the world.  It is situated in the city of Jaisalmer, in the Indian state of Rajasthan.  It is a World Heritage Site.  It was built in 1156 AD by the Rajput ruler Rawal Jaisal, from whom it derives its name.  The fort stands amidst the sandy expanse of the great Thar Desert, on Trikuta Hill.  Before the days of the British Raj, the fortress city served as a refuge and way-station for caravans and travelers along the Silk Road.  Its ramparts served as the backdrop for many battles in past centuries when the Silk Road still served as one of the main trade routes between East and West. The Maritime Silk Road, officially the 21st Century Maritime Silk Route Economic Belt ( is a Chinese strategic initiative to increase investment and foster collaboration across the historic Silk Road.  China–Pakistan Economic Corridor is an extension to proposed Silk Road. The Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-century Maritime Silk Road, better known as the One Belt and One Road Initiative (OBOR), The Belt and Road (B&R) and The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) (OBOR) is a development strategy proposed by China's paramount leader Xi Jinping that focuses on connectivity and cooperation between Eurasian countries, primarily the People's Republic of China (PRC), the land-based Silk Road Economic Belt (SREB) and the oceangoing Maritime Silk Road (MSR).  The strategy underlines China's push to take a larger role in global affairs with a China-centered trading network.  It was unveiled in September and October 2013 for SREB and MSR respectively.  It was also promoted by Premier Li Keqiang during the state visit to Asia and Europe and the most frequently mentioned concept in the "People's Daily" in 2016.  It was initially called "One Belt and One Road", but in mid-2016 the official English name was changed to the "Belt and Road Initiative" due to misinterpretations of the term "one".  In the past three years, the focuses were mainly on infrastructure investment, construction materials, railway and highway, automobile, real estate, power grid, and iron and steel. Silk Road Chamber of International Commerce (SRCIC), composed of national commercial associations of the Silk Road countries, is the first non-profitable and non-governmental international business confederation named after the Silk Road.  Currently SRCIC has 61 country members and millions of enterprises, forming up a community of shared interests, shared responsibilities and a shared future. Maritime Silk Road (Persian: راه آبی ابريشم‎ ‎ ) is a 2011 Iranian film about a man called Soleiman Siraf who, according to historical documents, was the first sailor to cross the Indian Ocean to China.  His route was then called the Maritime Silk Road and many merchants took that route to get their merchandise to China.  One of the passengers in this film is a young man named Shazan Ibn Yusof who keeps a log of the voyage.  The Maritime Silk Road started in The Persian Gulf and continued into India, Thailand and China.  Shooting for some scenes in the film took place in Kanchanaburi, Thailand and used elephants from the Taweechai Elephant Camp. The Registan was the heart of the ancient city of Samarkand of the Timurid dynasty, now in Uzbekistan.  The name "Rēgistan" (ریگستان ) means "Sandy place" or "desert" in Persian. The University Alliance of the Silk Road (Chinese: 丝绸之路大学联盟, also translated as the Universities Alliance of the Silk Road and abbreviated UASR) is a university alliance formed by Xi'an Jiaotong University, for the purpose of developing People's Republic of China's One Belt, One Road foreign policy initiative.  The UASR is a non-profit NGO whose objective is to build educational collaboration and promote economic growth in countries along the Silk Road Economic Belt. The Steppe Route was an ancient overland route through the Eurasian Steppe that was an active precursor of the Silk Road.  Silk and horses were traded as key commodities; secondary trade included furs, weapons, musical instruments, precious stones (turquoise, lapis lazuli, agate, nephrite) and jewels.  This route reached all the way across the northern Eurasian Steppe, stretching some 10 degrees north and south of 40°N latitude and extending for approximately 10000 km .  Trans-Eurasian trade through the Steppe Route precedes the conventional date for the origins of the Silk Road by at least two millennia. Samarkand (Uzbek: "Samarqand" ; Persian: سمرقند‎ ‎ ; Cyrillic/Russian: "Самарканд" ), alternatively Samarqand or Samarcand, is a city in modern-day Uzbekistan and is one of the oldest inhabited cities in Central Asia.  There is evidence of human activity in the area of the city from the late Paleolithic era, though there is no direct evidence of when exactly Samarkand was founded; some theories indicate that it was founded between the 8th and 7th centuries BC.  Prospering from its location on the Silk Road between China and the Mediterranean, at times Samarkand was one of the greatest cities of Central Asia. The Silk Road or Silk Route was an ancient network of trade routes that were for centuries central to cultural interaction originally through regions of Eurasia connecting the East and West and stretching from the Korean peninsula and Japan to the Mediterranean Sea.  The Silk Road concept refers to both the terrestrial and the maritime routes connecting Asia and Europe.  The overland Steppe route stretching through the Eurasian steppe is considered the ancestor to the Silk Road(s).
Answer: Samarkand