Han Timeline

700 BCE – 1644 CE · 4 sites

All sites in this period

Continent Record

Most-Visited Ancient Site in Asia

Great Wall of China

700 BCE – 1644 CE

The vast frontier fortification system of northern China — rammed-earth Qin walls and the iconic stone Ming battlements — remains the single most conspicuous monumental gap left in a global archaeological atlas.

933

Iron AgeClassicalImperial China

Cliff face and cave openings of the Kizil Buddhist grottoes, Xinjiang

Country Record

Known by the Most Names in China

Kizil Caves

300 CE – 800 CE

The earliest large complex of Buddhist rock-cut cave temples on the northern Silk Road, carved into cliffs above the Muzart River near Kucha — murals of Indo-Iranian and Central Asian style that predate and influenced later Chinese grotto art.

ClassicalLate AntiqueImperial China

Wind-eroded mud-brick and loess ruins of the ancient city of Jiaohe near Turpan

Continent Record

Northernmost Known Site in Asia

Jiaohe

200 BCE – 1400 CE

A spectacular cliff-top ruined city carved and built on a loess plateau between two river channels near Turpan — capital of the Nearer Jushi kingdom and later a key Silk Road garrison town, abandoned to the desert winds but retaining streets, Buddhist temples, and housing cut into yellow earth.

ClassicalImperial ChinaMedieval

Niya

100 BCE – 500 CE

A Silk Road oasis settlement swallowed by desert sands in the southern Tarim Basin — excavated wooden houses, orchards, and bilingual administrative documents that illuminate daily life in the Kroraina (Loulan) cultural sphere under Kushan and Chinese spheres of influence.

ClassicalRoman