Silk Road caravan network

Timeline

1. -200–1300Dunhuang · DunhuangFrom the Han dynasty Hexi Corridor to the Mongol Empire period, relay stations, customs checkpoints, and multilingual intermediary merchants integrated scattered trade routes into a repeatable transnational caravan system.
2. c. 1350–1460Samarkand · SamarkandAfter the plague and imperial collapse, Timurid successor states and local merchant guilds rebuilt the Central Asian hub; caravan sizes shrank but routes became more flexible, relying on city-state protection payments and family credit networks.
3. 1471–1480Hami · HamiThe Ming dynasty's northwestern tributary and mutual-trade channels, Central Asian caravans, and Ottoman–Venetian maritime spice trade ran in parallel; the Hami–Turpan line remained a key caravan node linking the Central Plains and the Western Regions.
4. c. 1500–1600Istanbul · IstanbulAfter the expansion of Portuguese–Ottoman maritime routes, traditional overland caravan profits declined and the network gradually gave way to ocean-going merchant companies, though local Central Asian trade and tributary channels survived in places.