Infographics: Exchanges between Chinese and Arab civilizations on Silk Road

Editor's note:

At the invitation of King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, Chinese President Xi Jinping paid a state visit to the Saudi Arabia from Dec. 7 to 10, attending the first China-Arab States Summit and the China-Gulf Cooperation Council Summit, both held in Saudi Arabia’s capital of Riyadh.

Xi’s trip is a major event in the development of China-Arab relations. The visit represents both the highest level and the largest scale diplomatic exchange between China and the Arab world since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949.

China has long standing friendships with Saudi Arabia and other Arab states, with historical accounts of friendly exchanges between Chinese and Arab peoples on ancient Silk Road trading routes stretching back thousands of years.

The People’s Daily Online has created this series of informational posters to share some of the key stories in the development of China-Arab relations, and to celebrate the ongoing friendship between the two civilizations.

Intellectual, cultural, and economic exchanges between China and Arab states date back more than 2,000 years. Through ancient Silk Road trading routes, China's porcelain, silk, tea, papermaking and printing techniques were introduced to the Arab world, while Arabian astronomical knowledge, the Arabian calendar and Arabian medicine became widely known in China.

During the Eastern Han Dynasty (25-220), a Chinese emissary named Gan Ying reached the "western seas" (i.e. the Persian Gulf) on his mission to the Roman Empire, leaving the first official record of Chinese envoys reaching the Gulf States.