闞氏高昌王國與柔然、西域的關係=Relations of the Gaochang Kingdom under the Kan Family with the Rouran Qaghanate and the Western Regions during the Second Half of the 5th Century
Documents recently unearthed from Turfan record the Gaochang Kingdom under the Kan family sending people and horses to escort foreign envoys back in the ninth and tenth of the year of Yongkang (474 and 475 AD). According to the documents, these envoys were from the Rouran (Ruanruan) Kingdom Uddyāna in north India, Liu-Song in south China, the oasis-based Zihe (Karghalik) at the southern fringe of the Tarim Basin, Brahman in the subcontinent of South Asia, and Yanqi (Karashahr) at the northern fringe of the Tarim Basin. Also documented were their missions and their route to Rouran via Gaochang. In the second half of the 5th century AD, Gaochang, where the documents about escorting the envoys were issued, played an irreplaceable role in Rouran’s control of the Western Regions and in its communications with the south.
