Annotation: " The presence of load-bearing camels here signals some sort of trade or possibly even tribute to the Song Dynasty's..." (Annotation)

Annotation: " The presence of load-bearing camels here signals some sort of trade or possibly even tribute to the Song Dynasty's..."

d06f37b7-34cb-48a8-b653-943f21268ed2

            The presence of load-bearing camels here signals some sort of trade or possibly even tribute to the Song Dynasty's northern neighbors. The camels are heading out of the city gate, so presumably they are carrying goods from Song China for trade or tribute. Hansen believes that the camel outside of the city gate is carrying goods “to distant points in the deserts of northwest China.[1] Indeed, in 1004, the Song started to “buy peace by agreeing to make annual payments of money and silk” from their northern neighbors.[2] Chinese goods that were exported “included large quantities included tea, silk, copper coins (widely used as a currency outside of China), paper and printed books, porcelain, lacquerware, jewelry, rice and other grains, ginger and other spices.”[3] These exports could have been sent west, overland along the Silk Road, or overland to its northern neighbors such as the Khitans, Jurchens, or Tanguts. Ironically, tribute that the Song paid to its northern neighbors would stimulate trade by providing their northern neighbors with the wealth needed to import Chinese goods. For example, some of the goods Song traders would return with were “silver that had originated with the Song and the horses that Song desperately needed for its armies, but also other animals such as camel and sheep, as well as goods that had traveled across the Silk Road, including fine Indian and Persian cotton cloth, precious gems, incense, and perfumes.”[4]

            Furthermore, the presence of camels on the scroll could be a sort of legitimizing symbol for the Song. As they struggled militarily with their northern neighbors, the Song could use the camels as a symbol that harkens back to the “golden eras” of the Han and Tang dynasties when the Xi Yu (“Western Regions”) – around modern-day Xinjiang, Gansu, and the Tarim Basin – were under Chinese control. Control of this region gave China under the Han and Tang outsized control over the eastern terminal of the Silk Road. And thus, depicting camels could have symbolized a way to project Song strength – that the Song were still capable of procuring camels which are not native to China – at a time when it struggled with its northern neighbors, even being forced to pay tribute for peace.