page_title: Silk Road transmission of Buddhism
section_title: Artistic influences
hierarchical_section_title: Silk Road transmission of Buddhism / Northern transmission (from North India and Central Asia) / Artistic influences
caption_attribution_description: English: "Heroic gesture of the Bodhisattva", 6th-7th century terracotta, Tumshuq (Xinjiang). Musee Guimet, Paris.
context_page_description: Buddhism entered Han China via the Silk Road, beginning in the 1st or 2nd century CE. The first documented translation efforts by Buddhist monks in China were in the 2nd century CE via the Kushan Empire into the Chinese territory bordering the Tarim Basin under Kanishka. These contacts transmitted strands of Sarvastivadan and Tamrashatiya Buddhism throughout the Eastern world.
  Theravada Buddhism developed from the Pāli Canon in Sri Lanka Tamrashatiya school and spread throughout Southeast Asia. Meanwhile, Sarvastivada Buddhism was transmitted from North India through Central Asia to China.
  Direct contact between Central Asian and Chinese Buddhism continued throughout the 3rd to 7th centuries, much into the Tang period. From the 4th century onward, Chinese pilgrims like Faxian and later Xuanzang started to travel to northern India in order to get improved access to original scriptures. Between the 3rd and 7th centuries, parts of the land route connecting northern India with China was ruled by the Xiongnu, Han dynasty, Kushan Empire, the Hephthalite Empire, the Göktürks, and the Tang dynasty. The Indian form of Buddhist tantra reached China in the 7th century.
context_section_description: Central Asian missionary efforts along the Silk Road were accompanied by a flux of artistic influences, visible in the development of Serindian art from the 2nd to the 11th century CE in the Tarim Basin, modern Xinjiang. Serindian art often derives from the art of the Gandhāra district of what is now Afghanistan and Pakistan.
  Highly sinicized forms of syncretism can also be found on the eastern portions of the Tarim Basin, such as in Dunhuang. Silk Road artistic influences can be found as far as Japan to this day, in architectural motifs or representations of Japanese gods.
caption: "Heroic gesture of the Bodhisattva", 6th–7th century terracotta, Tumshuq (Xinjiang)
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "SV-AS10 ImageData", "Image Make": "Panasonic", "Image Model": "SV-AS10", "Image Software": "Ver1.10J", "Image DateTime": "2000:02:26 08:58:11", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "164", "EXIF ExposureTime": "64/481", "EXIF FNumber": "4", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "200", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2000:02:26 08:58:11", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2000:02:26 08:58:11", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "12/5", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "291/100", "EXIF ApertureValue": "4", "EXIF BrightnessValue": "3/4", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "4", "EXIF MeteringMode": "CenterWeightedAverage", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "9/2", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1600", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1200", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CVAPattern": "[0, 2, 0, 2, 1, 0, 2, 1]", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "0", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "35", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}