and political moves to conquer the other two kingdoms in the 6th century CE , and with the help of the Tang Chinese dynasty , succeeded in conquering / uniting most of the peninsula in 668 CE . The Tang , however , had helped Silla merely as part of a divide-and-conquer strategy , and in turn began to fight the Silla . The Silla forces fought and defeated the Tang forces by 676 , and thereby unified most of the peninsula under the single , aristocratic government of the Silla kingdom . For Korean scholars , the Unified Silla kingdom ( 668 – 935 CE ) presents a golden age of the development in Korean culture , unified and separate from Chinese domination . 2
Silla was a prosperous kingdom : its economy was based on agriculture , but there were gold mines , iron mines and a complex handicraft industry orchestrated by the royal government . 3 The capital at Kyongju “ became a large and splendid city , having a million inhabitants at its height .” 4
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VI
Although Silla Korea was politically independent from Tang China , there was almost constant diplomatic , economic and cultural contact between Korea and China . Korea also became the conduit of Chinese ideas to Japan . Economically , the Silla became part of the Tang tributary system , and there was also much cultural borrowing between the two empires . 5 Silla Koreans borrowed and adapted thoughtfully , melding Chinese systems with native practices — a process Jerry Bentley termed syncretism . 6
When one teaches Tang China ( usually as part of the triumvirate of Sui , Tang , Song China ), it ’ s not hard to mention that other places in East Asia developed sophisticated urban economies in this era . Furthermore , one usually emphasizes the westward expansion of the Tang , and its control over the East and South China Seas . It ’ s easy to insert a piece about Tang ’ s eastward expansion , its unusual defeat and its accommodation of the Silla . This also gives some complexity to the idea of creating and maintaining a tributary empire and what it meant to be a tributary state . This is easy to do , and it sets up Korea as a political unit in East Asian history , and begins to familiarize students with Korea as a unit of analysis in World History . This leads us to the Silk Road .
SILK ROAD
The Silk Road was not really a single interstate highway , of course , but a series of trading routes . The first and easiest thing a teacher can do is to acquire a map that includes Korea and Japan ( cf . maps on pp . 5 & 34 ). A map will make the obvious point that the trade routes extended eastward from Chang ’ an as well as westward . The Eurasian trade routes of the Post-Classical period also extended into the waterways . The Indian Ocean Basin trade networks connected with the East Asian / South China Sea networks , and the foreign merchant port communities of southeast China became hubs of cross-cultural interactions between the Koreans and the wider Eurasian world .
When I discuss imperial roads and significant trade routes — Roman , Persian , Incan , trans- Saharan , Indian Ocean basin and the Silk Road — I give my students a little mantra : “ What travels across the roads ? Military , merchants and missionaries .” While this may not cover everything and everyone , it works really well for my students , and they have a ready handle with which to grasp the complicated interactions across “ trade routes .” Silla Korea and the Silk Road : Golden Age , Golden Threads
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