El desierto de Takla Makan sigue siendo un lugar rodeado de misterio. Los antiguos creían que una vez que entrabas a este lugar no había salida.

a Belleza de Xiaohe (ca. 1800-1500 a. C.) está muy bien conservada. Su cuerpo fue encontrado envuelto en una amplia capa de lana. Cortesía de la Oficina de Reliquias Culturales de Xinjiang y Wang Da-Gang. fuente

Hace mucho tiempo aquí había casas y templos. Hoy todo está enterrado bajo la arena.

Preciosas reliquias antiguas se esconden en las profundidades del “Mar de la Muerte”, o el desierto de Takla Makan.

Los arqueólogos están empezando a descubrir algunos de los secretos que se han escondido en esta misteriosa región. Aun así, parece que sólo estamos arañando la superficie y sólo el tiempo dirá qué más maravillas esperan ser desveladas.

The Sleeping Beauty of Loulan was discovered in 1980 when a film was being made about the Silk Road. A closer examination of the region led to the discovery of 200 mummies that were buried in relatively shallow graves, and with no elaborate embalming rituals. What was remarkable about the mummies was the fact that they were in much better condition than the Egyptian mummies in the Valley of the Kings.

The Loulan mummy is of Caucasian origin. She has high cheekbones, high bridged nose, and blonde hair.

She died sometime in her 40s and is still dressed in her red robes, her hair crisply braided in what was probably a very fashionable 3800 years ago. It is believed that she died from the hard life she lived, traveling the Silk Road to an unknown destination, breathing in a toxic mix of dust, sand, and smoke from open fires that eventually destroyed her lungs.

She was buried alongside another mummy known as the Cherchen Man, a six-foot redhead whose DNA has revealed he was a Celt. How these two came to be buried by the Silk Road, along with two other women and a baby and surrounded by hundreds of other mummies of European origin found in the same area, is a tantalizing mystery.

Who was she, and why did she die so far from her ancestral homeland? It is not possible to tell, but the company with which she lay was a very mixed one.

Among them were warriors, kings, farmers and artisans, all taking their last rest at least a 1000 years before Caucasians were believed to have ventured this far into Asia. The Uyghur people, who themselves look more European than Asian immediately claimed the Loulan Beauty as their ancestor, and insist that this is proof they inhabited the region before the Chinese. This proved a sticking point in the study of these mummies since the Chinese discouraged foreign scientists from investigating the remains.

However, in 1993, Professor Victor H. Mair of the University of Pennsylvania, and Italian geneticist Paolo Francalacci obtained and were able to study samples of the remains. From these samples, the pair was able to confirm that the mummies were European in origin, and not related to the Uyghur.

They possibly crossed into China from Siberia, into an area that once was green and hospitable, where people from many cultures came together, from Han Chinese to Northern Celts.

The oldest corpse is an old man who died 1500 years ago, the youngest a tiny baby in a bonnet, with blue stones covering its eyes. With their European origins, there were very likely many blue-eyed people among travelers.

The implications of this discovery are far-reaching. Clearly the ancient world of 3000-4000 years ago was more of a melting pot than has previously been believed, and cultures from Northern Europe and Asia were well known to each other.

Junto a la Bella Durmiente de Loulan se encontró una momia llamada Hombre Cherchen. Museo Regional de Xinjiang, Urumqi, China Ofrece una imagen de un mundo antiguo más cosmopolita y facilita la comprensión de por qué algunos mitos, historias y arte son comunes a tantas culturas. Por ejemplo, el “nudo interminable” de los celtas es un motivo familiar también en el arte chino.

¿Ayudaron el guerrero pelirrojo y la Bella Durmiente de Loulan a traerlos a Asia, o otros de su cultura los aceptaron de regreso?

Sólo la Belleza de Loulan lo sabe con seguridad, y se llevó su secreto a la tumba.

Hoy, la Belleza Loulan se encuentra en una vitrina en el Museo de la Región Autónoma Uigur de Xinjiang, especialmente climatizada para evitar cualquier deterioro.

Al igual que la momia que parpadea, la momia de Loulan aún se conserva sorprendentemente y sigue siendo una belleza mucho después de su muerte.