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Unravelling the Silk Road: Travels and Textiles in Central Asia
Veteran traveler and textile expert Chris Aslan explores the Silk, Wool and Cotton Roads of Central Asia Three textile roads tangle their way through Central Asia. The famous Silk Road united east and west through trade. Older still was the Wool Road, of critical importance when houses made from wool enabled nomads to traverse the inhospitable winter steppes. Then there was the Cotton Road, marked by greed, colonialism and environmental disaster. At this intersection of human history, fortunes were made and lost through shimmering silks, life-giving felts and gossamer cottons. Chris Aslan, who has spent fifteen years living and working in the region, expertly unravels the strands of this tangled history and embroiders them with his own experiences of life in the heart of Asia.
- GenresTravelNonfictionHistory
352 pages, Hardcover
Published June 15, 2023
23 people are currently reading
268 people want to read
About the author
Chris Aslan
6 books38 followersChris Aslan was born in Turkey (hence the name Aslan) and spent his childhood there and in war-torn Beirut. After school, Chris spent two years at sea before studying Media and journalism at Leicester University. He then moved to Khiva, a desert oasis in Uzbekistan, establishing a UNESCO workshop reviving fifteenth century carpet designs and embroideries, and becoming the largest non-government employer in town. He was expelled as part of an anti-Western purge, and took a year in Cambridge to write A Carpet Ride to Khiva. Chris then spent three years in the Pamirs mountains of Tajikistan, training yak herders to comb their yaks for their cashmere-like down. Next came a couple of years in Kyrgyzstan living in the world’s largest natural walnut forest and establishing a wood-carving workshop. Since then, Chris has studied and rowed at Oxford, lectures internationally, and regularly returns to Central Asia, having left a large chunk of his heart there. He's based in North Cyprus in a mountainous village overlooking the sea, and is overrun with cats.
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Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
May 21, 2025
Having been fascinated and read many books about the Silk Road, any new publication is always a pull… but many books feel like facts have just been regurgitated. However, Unravelling the Silk Road by Chris Aslan brings a fresh perspective and understanding to the Silk Road
The focus of the book explores the trading of three key products - wool, silk and cotton - digging into the history of each and the impact on the lives of individuals and the regions.
Using Chris Aslan’s personal knowledge and experiences of living and working in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, this book is as much a fascinating travelogue / personal autobiography as it is a fascinating historical and geographical read.
Digging into the past of these three textiles and their commercial routes between China and Europe over centuries , Chris takes us on a journey as to how these products carried so much commercial and cultural power and influence - in particular the impact of soviet occupation resulted in the decimation of many crafts associated with wool, silk and cotton.
This is a book about the past, the present and the future ( how new trade routes and lives are being affected by political and cultural changes) This is a book for historians, those with a deep appreciation of geography and cultures or readers who just want to broaden their knowledge of the wider world around them.
Written with warmth, compassion to save dying creative and art forms and deep knowledge of a fascinating part of the globe and its history, this is a wonderful read. Highly recommended
The focus of the book explores the trading of three key products - wool, silk and cotton - digging into the history of each and the impact on the lives of individuals and the regions.
Using Chris Aslan’s personal knowledge and experiences of living and working in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, this book is as much a fascinating travelogue / personal autobiography as it is a fascinating historical and geographical read.
Digging into the past of these three textiles and their commercial routes between China and Europe over centuries , Chris takes us on a journey as to how these products carried so much commercial and cultural power and influence - in particular the impact of soviet occupation resulted in the decimation of many crafts associated with wool, silk and cotton.
This is a book about the past, the present and the future ( how new trade routes and lives are being affected by political and cultural changes) This is a book for historians, those with a deep appreciation of geography and cultures or readers who just want to broaden their knowledge of the wider world around them.
Written with warmth, compassion to save dying creative and art forms and deep knowledge of a fascinating part of the globe and its history, this is a wonderful read. Highly recommended
August 31, 2023
Heard a talk by the author about his first book, so I bought this, the second. It’s excellent, writes as he speaks. Much information with a human face about a part of the world about which I know little. Check the labels before you buy any further clothing.
May 30, 2025
I enjoyed this book. I read it after returning from a trip to Uzbekistan and reading the author's first book about the carpet making shop he established. The title of this book is a bit misleading. The book is divided into three parts -- Cotton Road, Silk Road, and Wool Road, with the Silk Road being the shortest and much of it I had read in the Khiva book. The Cotton Road section was the most interesting, as growing cotton under the Soviets resulted in tremendous environmental damage. There was a lot of fascinating history in all sections. Highly recommended for anyone interested in Central Asian countries.
January 14, 2026
Fantastic read. I loved how the author weaved together history with personal anecdotes and accounts of others. I learnt so much reading this book and found it very thought provoking, especially on the topic of fast fashion and the cotton industry.
June 14, 2025
Fave book of the year so far
September 6, 2024
In its strictest historical sense, globalization is not a new or even modern concept at all. Exchange of products and services coupled with transfer of wealth across administrative frontiers is what we call globalization now. It does not need ships, aircraft or the internet even though these would greatly aid the trade. In fact, man traded across his tribal borders most of the time and a nation is a somewhat larger tribe. Textiles, spices, tools and jewellery were some of the material interchanged. Central Asia was a major land route of caravan trade between India and China on the eastern side and the Roman Empire and medieval European kingdoms on the western part before maritime navigation had not developed. Out of the cargo, textiles comprised of wool, silk and cotton in the chronological order. The history of the discovery of these materials and how it transformed the societies through which it was carried through provides intriguing reading. Chris Aslan was born in Turkey and spent his childhood there. He lived in the deserts and mountains of Central Asia for fifteen years and still returns regularly to the region. He is a British national. The author has embroidered the wool, silk and cotton roads with his own experiences of living in the region. The book focusses on the crossing points of the roads in Central Asia rather than their termini.
Aslan was drawn to Central Asia as part of his doctoral research in the years following the collapse of the Soviet Union. There was not much appeal for democracy in these republics and all of them became ensconced in the palms of former communist party officials who ruled them like dictators. The author first took up a job for promoting tourism in Khiva, Uzbekistan with tenure of two years which got extended to fifteen years. He was involved in work that touched the soul of these lands. He set up a project for de-hairing the fibre from the wool collected from yaks known as yak down. The down is one of the lightest, warmest fibres in the world, three times warmer than sheep wool. This was commercially harvested only from the 1970s and is still often passed off as cashmere. However, the raw fibre is scratchy because it contains the rugged outer hair. Separating this irritant thing is a very tedious process which the author established in the barren landscape of Uzbekistan. History records that Babur employed slaves to do this all day and usually ended up with half a kg a day. Aslan worked in Central Asia under the aegis of a Swedish organization called Operation Mercy which the author glosses over as a Christian organization. Probably, this was an evangelist outfit engaged in religious conversion and missionary work on the sly. This is all the more prescient as the author was expelled from all three countries in which he worked – Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan – for causing social unrest as claimed by the governments and in one case for translating the Bible to the local language.
The Central Asian republics still show scars of Russian colonialism first under the Tsars and then Communists. The Tsars annexed these lands in a bid to extend their borders to the Arabian Sea. This put them on a collision course with British colonial regime in India who was trying to nibble its way towards the north, in opposition to the Russian move. This hide and seek match which was the Cold War of the times is called the Great Game. The Bolsheviks employed great effort to settle the nomads and turn them into agriculturists. What began as incentives later transformed into coercion since the nomads were not eager to change their traditional ways. Anyone who owned more than 400 cattle were termed ‘class enemy’ and forcibly dislocated to gulags in Siberia. In an assault on the family unit, wives could be spared exile and destitution only by divorcing their husbands. Stalin launched his notorious five-year plans in 1929 with forced collectivization at its core. All nomads in Turkestan were expected to settle in collective farms. Under-resourced, badly planned and without adequate housing, these farms failed. Livestock died, crops failed and everyone starved. This entirely avoidable, manmade famine killed 1.5 million people but Stalin achieved his objective of largely wiping out nomadism. Family businesses in handicrafts like silk weaving were banned by the Communists as part of an attempt to break down pre-Soviet society and force them into factories instead. Centuries of artistic skill and talent was destroyed along with the complex guilds and training mechanisms that passed down these skills (p.182).
Even though the book’s title flaunts silk prominently, it is not the sole point of concentration in the text. Even then, it describes the various stages of silk production right from the hatching of eggs. The voracious appetite of silkworms is legendary and Aslan narrates some first-hand experiences of dealing with these useful insects. Ancient China was the birthplace of silk and they jealously guarded its production a secret from the outside world. The book includes some stories that look more like legends about how silk eventually transgressed the Great Wall. The Roman Empire was a huge consumer of Chinese silk. One bolt of silk was worth then around 60 kg of rice. Several bolts made up a bale and large camels could carry 250 kg on a long journey. The immense profit accrued on these hazardous journeys across the deserts of Central Asia was worth the risk in attempting the trade. The risk was enormous – an unexpected dry well in an oasis could end up in the death and destruction of the whole caravan. By Justinian’s time, silkworm eggs reached Constantinople and silk-weaving industry flourished in the metropolis. They found the maritime route quicker and more economical. Silk Road then fell into decline. This was not a single long road; it was a network of trading routes. The name was coined only in the nineteenth century.
The book gives equal emphasis to cotton in the narrative. It also brings out the ecological damage this fibre is causing to desiccated Central Asia. Cotton requires ten times as much water as wheat. Scarce water resources were diverted to cotton fields through canals to irrigate them. The Aral Sea, which is a land-locked water body that is roughly the size of Sri Lanka, dried up as a result of this water diversion. The book describes the author’s visits to former harbour towns where the rusting boats are stranded now in the middle of the desert. It we look at the history of cotton, it is seen that exploitation was woven into its fabric from the colonial times. Colonialism exploited India for getting raw cotton, African slaves were captured and transported to the New World to grow cotton and British children were exploited in appalling conditions in the textile mills of Manchester. Cotton manufactured in mechanized looms in the British Northwest undercut Indian produce and India was deindustrialized. Workers went back to fields for cultivation again which ushered in a doomed period of misery and abject poverty. Aslan finds a piece of Dhaka Muslin cloth which is a rare specimen of cotton that is extremely densely woven but exceedingly light and almost transparent. It was worth sixteen times the price of silk. Amir Khusrau noted that a hundred yards of it could pass through the eye of a needle and is described as ‘webs of woven wind’. Only one type of cotton plant found in the hot and humid banks of Brahmaputra and Meghna rivers could create a thread fine enough to make Dhaka Muslin. Production of just one bolt of it could take five months of labour. The type of plant that produced Dhaka Muslin fibres cross-pollinated with hybrid American upland cotton and became extinct. The last of the muslins was woven in the 1860s. Now, a search is on for rediscovering the plant. The book includes a photograph of Dhaka Muslin in a London antique shop. It is so translucent that the glint of the gold ring on an attendant’s finger behind the fabric is clearly seen on the other side.
The book provides a pleasant reading experience and almost a tactile feel of the dressing material described in exclusive detail. Many years of stay and intermingling with local people enable Aslan to dwell authoritatively upon the cultural practices as well as handicrafts. The magical charms used by the Central Asian people to ward off the evil eye makes for a nostalgic touch as we encounter many similarities to those in India. The author had a very adventurous life in living with nature. He was once gored by a yak which mistook his approach to her kid as with malicious intent; had scorpion stings on his chest; swam across the Panj river into Afghanistan which was frequented by narcotics smugglers and had crossed an ice-cold rivulet on a yak while clinging to the herder who was driving it. The author has made a very thorough research for this book and has given many remarks made by early European explorers in nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries to leave an impression that these societies were by and large static and not much has changed. Several good books of this genre are listed in the bibliography. On the negative side, the nitty-gritty of weaving a cloth or carpet may be boring for the ordinary reader when it is repeated many times as they will be having no clue of the technical names of the weaving process or machinery.
The book is highly recommended.
Aslan was drawn to Central Asia as part of his doctoral research in the years following the collapse of the Soviet Union. There was not much appeal for democracy in these republics and all of them became ensconced in the palms of former communist party officials who ruled them like dictators. The author first took up a job for promoting tourism in Khiva, Uzbekistan with tenure of two years which got extended to fifteen years. He was involved in work that touched the soul of these lands. He set up a project for de-hairing the fibre from the wool collected from yaks known as yak down. The down is one of the lightest, warmest fibres in the world, three times warmer than sheep wool. This was commercially harvested only from the 1970s and is still often passed off as cashmere. However, the raw fibre is scratchy because it contains the rugged outer hair. Separating this irritant thing is a very tedious process which the author established in the barren landscape of Uzbekistan. History records that Babur employed slaves to do this all day and usually ended up with half a kg a day. Aslan worked in Central Asia under the aegis of a Swedish organization called Operation Mercy which the author glosses over as a Christian organization. Probably, this was an evangelist outfit engaged in religious conversion and missionary work on the sly. This is all the more prescient as the author was expelled from all three countries in which he worked – Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan – for causing social unrest as claimed by the governments and in one case for translating the Bible to the local language.
The Central Asian republics still show scars of Russian colonialism first under the Tsars and then Communists. The Tsars annexed these lands in a bid to extend their borders to the Arabian Sea. This put them on a collision course with British colonial regime in India who was trying to nibble its way towards the north, in opposition to the Russian move. This hide and seek match which was the Cold War of the times is called the Great Game. The Bolsheviks employed great effort to settle the nomads and turn them into agriculturists. What began as incentives later transformed into coercion since the nomads were not eager to change their traditional ways. Anyone who owned more than 400 cattle were termed ‘class enemy’ and forcibly dislocated to gulags in Siberia. In an assault on the family unit, wives could be spared exile and destitution only by divorcing their husbands. Stalin launched his notorious five-year plans in 1929 with forced collectivization at its core. All nomads in Turkestan were expected to settle in collective farms. Under-resourced, badly planned and without adequate housing, these farms failed. Livestock died, crops failed and everyone starved. This entirely avoidable, manmade famine killed 1.5 million people but Stalin achieved his objective of largely wiping out nomadism. Family businesses in handicrafts like silk weaving were banned by the Communists as part of an attempt to break down pre-Soviet society and force them into factories instead. Centuries of artistic skill and talent was destroyed along with the complex guilds and training mechanisms that passed down these skills (p.182).
Even though the book’s title flaunts silk prominently, it is not the sole point of concentration in the text. Even then, it describes the various stages of silk production right from the hatching of eggs. The voracious appetite of silkworms is legendary and Aslan narrates some first-hand experiences of dealing with these useful insects. Ancient China was the birthplace of silk and they jealously guarded its production a secret from the outside world. The book includes some stories that look more like legends about how silk eventually transgressed the Great Wall. The Roman Empire was a huge consumer of Chinese silk. One bolt of silk was worth then around 60 kg of rice. Several bolts made up a bale and large camels could carry 250 kg on a long journey. The immense profit accrued on these hazardous journeys across the deserts of Central Asia was worth the risk in attempting the trade. The risk was enormous – an unexpected dry well in an oasis could end up in the death and destruction of the whole caravan. By Justinian’s time, silkworm eggs reached Constantinople and silk-weaving industry flourished in the metropolis. They found the maritime route quicker and more economical. Silk Road then fell into decline. This was not a single long road; it was a network of trading routes. The name was coined only in the nineteenth century.
The book gives equal emphasis to cotton in the narrative. It also brings out the ecological damage this fibre is causing to desiccated Central Asia. Cotton requires ten times as much water as wheat. Scarce water resources were diverted to cotton fields through canals to irrigate them. The Aral Sea, which is a land-locked water body that is roughly the size of Sri Lanka, dried up as a result of this water diversion. The book describes the author’s visits to former harbour towns where the rusting boats are stranded now in the middle of the desert. It we look at the history of cotton, it is seen that exploitation was woven into its fabric from the colonial times. Colonialism exploited India for getting raw cotton, African slaves were captured and transported to the New World to grow cotton and British children were exploited in appalling conditions in the textile mills of Manchester. Cotton manufactured in mechanized looms in the British Northwest undercut Indian produce and India was deindustrialized. Workers went back to fields for cultivation again which ushered in a doomed period of misery and abject poverty. Aslan finds a piece of Dhaka Muslin cloth which is a rare specimen of cotton that is extremely densely woven but exceedingly light and almost transparent. It was worth sixteen times the price of silk. Amir Khusrau noted that a hundred yards of it could pass through the eye of a needle and is described as ‘webs of woven wind’. Only one type of cotton plant found in the hot and humid banks of Brahmaputra and Meghna rivers could create a thread fine enough to make Dhaka Muslin. Production of just one bolt of it could take five months of labour. The type of plant that produced Dhaka Muslin fibres cross-pollinated with hybrid American upland cotton and became extinct. The last of the muslins was woven in the 1860s. Now, a search is on for rediscovering the plant. The book includes a photograph of Dhaka Muslin in a London antique shop. It is so translucent that the glint of the gold ring on an attendant’s finger behind the fabric is clearly seen on the other side.
The book provides a pleasant reading experience and almost a tactile feel of the dressing material described in exclusive detail. Many years of stay and intermingling with local people enable Aslan to dwell authoritatively upon the cultural practices as well as handicrafts. The magical charms used by the Central Asian people to ward off the evil eye makes for a nostalgic touch as we encounter many similarities to those in India. The author had a very adventurous life in living with nature. He was once gored by a yak which mistook his approach to her kid as with malicious intent; had scorpion stings on his chest; swam across the Panj river into Afghanistan which was frequented by narcotics smugglers and had crossed an ice-cold rivulet on a yak while clinging to the herder who was driving it. The author has made a very thorough research for this book and has given many remarks made by early European explorers in nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries to leave an impression that these societies were by and large static and not much has changed. Several good books of this genre are listed in the bibliography. On the negative side, the nitty-gritty of weaving a cloth or carpet may be boring for the ordinary reader when it is repeated many times as they will be having no clue of the technical names of the weaving process or machinery.
The book is highly recommended.
June 17, 2024
This book is a must for anyone travelling to Central Asia, and/or anyone who has an interest in textiles. It's engaging, really fascinating, very readable, and just a pleasure from the first day. I read while on holiday in Kyrgyzstan and learnt so much. Chris Aslan really knows his stuff.
January 23, 2024
Chris Aslan was born in Turkey and spent his childhood there and in war-torn Beirut. He lived in the deserts and mountains of Central Asia for 15 years, and still returns regularly to the region.
I absolutely adore the writing style of this author, as we know this is a subject he has lived a great part of his life. The familiarity with which he writes conveys his love and knowledge of this very exotic part of the world. The Silk Road has fascinated me for a long time and I imagine the many centuries where traders passed each other to and from their distant destinations. Of the many books I have read, this tops them. Part travelogue and part history lesson, the author betrays his obvious love for the place. I encourage the reader to take this journey and breath in the air and exoticism in Unravelling the Silk Road. Thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the chance to review this fascinating book.
I absolutely adore the writing style of this author, as we know this is a subject he has lived a great part of his life. The familiarity with which he writes conveys his love and knowledge of this very exotic part of the world. The Silk Road has fascinated me for a long time and I imagine the many centuries where traders passed each other to and from their distant destinations. Of the many books I have read, this tops them. Part travelogue and part history lesson, the author betrays his obvious love for the place. I encourage the reader to take this journey and breath in the air and exoticism in Unravelling the Silk Road. Thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the chance to review this fascinating book.
April 20, 2024
Fascinating on so many levels. Learning about more history of the USSR was incredible something were shielded from in the uk education system. Surprised to learn about colonialism from the Russian perspective… it’s usually only the brits we hear about. History of all of the textiles as well just incredible.
Feel it would be even better if split out into 4 stories… Chris’s story; and one on each of the different roads. There is soo much to share.. so much to learn.
Feel it would be even better if split out into 4 stories… Chris’s story; and one on each of the different roads. There is soo much to share.. so much to learn.
May 17, 2024
Really lovely and engageing book written by the person who is clearly more than a tourist and genuinely cares about the region and it's peoples. I feel like it might require a bit of a prerequisite knowledge about the area. That's obviously not a downfall just something to be aware of when going into it. Also thanks to the publishing house for sending me a wonderful hard back copy for free :) (btw this review is not sponsored)
September 7, 2023
If you've read Chris Aslan's first book, A Carpet Ride to Khiva, it's worth saying that this is much more of a history than an autobiography. The history of this region is fascinating and at times really tragic. It was a thought-provoking read, but the personal stories interspersed made it stand out.
September 7, 2025
I may be biased, given I know both the author and some of the people and places he writes about, but this is a well-researched mix of personal anecdotes and historic insights into the beguiling world of Central Asia. E.g. via p.177: "Within the district of Bokhara they [the Jews] are not allowed to ride in the streets, and in the villages' of the oasis of Bokhara only on a female ass." [Ole Olufsen (1911) The emir of Bokhara and his country : journeys and studies in Bokhara (with a chapter on my voyage on the Amu Darya to Khiva)] and p.219: "To manufacture just one pair of jeans requires 11,000 litres of water." The reference to Jane and Andrew's house in Bukhara (where I stayed with Susan and Sarah in spring 1997) brought back memories: "To the right was the main guest room with with beautiful carved wooden doors, a high ceiling of carved beams, and walls of intricate plasterwork covered in verses from the Hebrew scriptures, with plaster niches for teapots and bowls. The rest of the courtyard consisted of a doorway into a cramped kitchen, a cosy winter living room with thick walls, and a small, windowless bedroom that led off it. Outside was a rickety staircase that led to a flat roof and a small bedroom where Jane and Andrew slept." It was in this house that I also recall that "A semi-owned cat prowled." From this, Chris might have added, Jane would remove fleas, to be crushed between her fingernails and placed on the tablecloth - offending Susan's sensibilities just as much as Susan's arrival with a wheeled suitcase "in the old Jewish quarter of Bukhara" had Jane's!
July 1, 2023
Books like this are why I read. Aslan takes you on a journey along the three textile roads in central Asia covering the Silk Road, the Wool Road and the Cotton Road. Part historical, part biographical, there are sad stories, happy stories and some down right wild stories, like run-ins with the KGB, Kyrgyz bride-napping, and a rescued snow leopard cub - without spoiling it too much.
Not only did this book make me think about how textiles are sourced, the impact to the planet and the working conditions of those working tirelessly to produce these textiles, it also provided me with some fascinating facts and explanations of cultural differences highlighting just how little I understood about this part of the world.
Aslan has lived in or visited many of the places discussed in the book and his writing overflows with affection and admiration for all the people he has met along the way. He weaves together the history of the three textile roads with stories of the people you don't think of when you put on your clothes or close your curtains at night.
Interesting, detailed and at times heart-warming, definitely worth a read.
Enormous thanks to @NetGalley and @iconbooks for a copy in exchange for my honest review.
Not only did this book make me think about how textiles are sourced, the impact to the planet and the working conditions of those working tirelessly to produce these textiles, it also provided me with some fascinating facts and explanations of cultural differences highlighting just how little I understood about this part of the world.
Aslan has lived in or visited many of the places discussed in the book and his writing overflows with affection and admiration for all the people he has met along the way. He weaves together the history of the three textile roads with stories of the people you don't think of when you put on your clothes or close your curtains at night.
Interesting, detailed and at times heart-warming, definitely worth a read.
Enormous thanks to @NetGalley and @iconbooks for a copy in exchange for my honest review.
April 28, 2025
This is an excellent new book about how wool, cotton and silk helped to shape Central Asia.
Aslan is known to many textile enthusiasts for his book A Carpet Ride to Khiva, where he tells the story of building a successful hand woven carpet factory in that Uzbek city.
This book is equally enjoyable. As an aid worker in Taijikstan he tries to set up an income generating project processing yak down, a soft material locals often threw away.
Back in Uzbekistan he investigates establishing a silk worm growing cooperative. Over 10 billion silk worm cocoons are spun every year, with Uzbekistan producing just five per cent (China, by contrast, produces 80 per cent). Yet Uzbekistan has the highest percentage of its population working in sericulture. Often grown by village women, it is time consuming and laborious work, which does not pay well.
Growing cotton in Uzbekistan's semi-autonomous Karakalpakstan is also hard work. It is responsible for draining the Aral Sea (once the world's fourth largest inland sea, about the size of Sri Lanka).
This book is highly readable and will be enjoyable by anyone interested in textiles and/or Central Asia. It combines both history and contemporary life, travel and textiles. What more could anyone want?
Aslan is known to many textile enthusiasts for his book A Carpet Ride to Khiva, where he tells the story of building a successful hand woven carpet factory in that Uzbek city.
This book is equally enjoyable. As an aid worker in Taijikstan he tries to set up an income generating project processing yak down, a soft material locals often threw away.
Back in Uzbekistan he investigates establishing a silk worm growing cooperative. Over 10 billion silk worm cocoons are spun every year, with Uzbekistan producing just five per cent (China, by contrast, produces 80 per cent). Yet Uzbekistan has the highest percentage of its population working in sericulture. Often grown by village women, it is time consuming and laborious work, which does not pay well.
Growing cotton in Uzbekistan's semi-autonomous Karakalpakstan is also hard work. It is responsible for draining the Aral Sea (once the world's fourth largest inland sea, about the size of Sri Lanka).
This book is highly readable and will be enjoyable by anyone interested in textiles and/or Central Asia. It combines both history and contemporary life, travel and textiles. What more could anyone want?
July 15, 2023
How do you introduce someone to a world you love?
You do 2 things:
1. You invite them to walk with you through the people, places and stories you know. You make it personal.
2. You introduce them to the stories and themes of this world from a higher, more objective perspective.
Chris Aslan does both incredibly skillfully in this lovely book about the Silk Road. He somehow allows you to enter this world (foreign to me prior to reading this book), both in his footsteps and at 10 000 feet.
It's a lovely tapestry of personal adventure and geopolitical history around people and places beyond the horizon many of us know.
You do 2 things:
1. You invite them to walk with you through the people, places and stories you know. You make it personal.
2. You introduce them to the stories and themes of this world from a higher, more objective perspective.
Chris Aslan does both incredibly skillfully in this lovely book about the Silk Road. He somehow allows you to enter this world (foreign to me prior to reading this book), both in his footsteps and at 10 000 feet.
It's a lovely tapestry of personal adventure and geopolitical history around people and places beyond the horizon many of us know.
January 22, 2025
Aslan's journey through the Stans provide a nice window into some of the history of the region, told through the author's own lived experience in Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. The weaving (pun intended) of the history of trade and cotton, silk and wool is a nice way of interlocking the history with place, but the book felt light on some of the historical significance and heavy on some of the personal anecdotes at times. In fairness to the author, I had just come off a historical text, and consequently made unfair comparisons based on unrealistic expectations for research. That said, I still feel like I'm still glad I looked into Aslan's window.
June 6, 2025
Unravelling the Silk Road is an impressive book on many levels. It is rare to read something so historically broad and deep that also has a personal touch while not drifting into egotism or disrespect. The author brings across the beauty and vitality of a region that merits more attention, and remains readable when dealing with complex issues. This approach also serves to help readers investigate their own apparel habits and to consider changes that will be of benefit globally – and yet the book never feels lecturing or judgemental – it merely presents under-publicised issues in a way that will make you happy to play a part in their rectification.
November 27, 2024
Possibly one of the best books I've read this year -- Chris Aslan, who has spent 15 years living and working in Central Asia, expertly weaves together the stories of own travels with the history of the region. He organizes his books along certain "roads": The Wool Road, the Silk Road, the Cotton Road -- the 3 historical periods when textiles came to define these lands history and the fate of it's people. I learned a lot from this book and consider it a must read.
August 18, 2025
I enjoyed this book so thoroughly. It was a real education and a fascinating and compassionate journey.
So much information regarding textiles, people and politics. I loved this book and it's one that will stay on my shelves and be read again and again until I can absorb all its wonderful information.
What a find ..
So much information regarding textiles, people and politics. I loved this book and it's one that will stay on my shelves and be read again and again until I can absorb all its wonderful information.
What a find ..
October 23, 2025
--The book would have been a much faster read if the author had used much more detailed maps with many more cities, and had added and labeled mountain ranges Likewise, an even larger glossary so one wouldn't have to google so many terms.
--I liked how the book was divided into the wool road, silk road, and cotton road. Didn't realize how destructive cotton farming is to the environment.
--I liked how the book was divided into the wool road, silk road, and cotton road. Didn't realize how destructive cotton farming is to the environment.
March 25, 2024
An interesting history of textiles in Central Asia. Chris Aslan has years of experience working with artisans in the area and the book contains elements of history, travel and how wool, silk and cotton have influenced life in the region.
April 8, 2025
Fascinating insight to the fabric routes into society
Nicely written, very comprehensive and informative. Even if you think you know something, you realise that what you are aware of is just the surface.
Well done, Aslan .
Nicely written, very comprehensive and informative. Even if you think you know something, you realise that what you are aware of is just the surface.
Well done, Aslan .
December 31, 2024
An easy and informative read.
January 14, 2025
Absolutely fantastic book. This is by far the best book I've read on Central Asia, with accessible prose, a clear purpose, and incredibly engaging stories. I learned a ton, and equally enjoyed the return to many places that are now familiar to me. The discussions framed by textile were informative and interesting. I'm not necessarily especially interested in textiles, broadly speaking, more than anything else, but that was not an issue. Highly recommend.
January 7, 2025
I loved this book!! Even after having lived in the region myself for many years, I learned so much. The way Aslan weaves his tale makes the people, cultures and out of the way places of Central Asia come alive for those who may never get to experience them firsthand. Quite possibly the best travel book I’ve read!
November 5, 2024
I was looking forward to reading this book after having enjoyed A Carpet Ride to Khiva. However, all I felt was disappointment, particularly with the western cultural imperialist attitude. The author’s negativity to traders trying to make a living, and tourists who want a souvenir left me feeling sad. The phrase ‘caveat emptor’ has probably existed since people started trading. The author makes unsubstantiated claims about a supposed legal case (no referencing) which makes one wonder about the ‘facts’ in this book. Don’t bother reading, especially if you enjoyed Carpet Ride to Khiva.
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