Central Asia

Figure 1. Silk road routes from India into Central Asia, leading towards China. Source: Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The region of Central Asia during the Silk Road period is shown approximately within the green border.

Central Asia. A geographic region in the center of the Eurasian land mass for which there are multiple definitions. In the context of the spread of Buddhism along the ancient Silk Road, Central Asia generally refers to the regions east and north of the Tibetan plateau.

The region east of the Tibetan plateau consists of the modern states of Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Afghanistan, and parts of Pakistan. The area north of the Tibetan plateau is the Tarim Basin.

Further reading

• Buddhism in Central Asia
• Central Asia, Wikipedia