Xinjiang Taklamkan Desert
Located in Central Asia, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China, Taklamkan desert (Chinese: ) is the second largest mobile desert in the world and the origin of Xinjiang civilization. The Taklamakan Desert is bounded by the Kunlun Mountains to the south, and the Pamir Mountains and Tian Shan to the west and north. The name is probably a Uyghur borrowing of Arabic tark, "to leave alone/out/behind, relinquish, abandon" + makan, "place".
As one of the largest sandy deserts in the world, Taklamkan Desert covers an area of 270,000 square kilometers of the Tarim Basin, 1,000 kilometers long and 400 kilometers wide. It is crossed at its northern and at its southern edge by two branches of the Silk Road as travelers sought to avoid the arid wasteland. In recent years, China has constructed a cross-desert highway that links the cities of Hotan (on the southern edge) and Luntai (on the northern edge). Taklamakan enjoys a paradigmatic cold desert climate. Given its relative proximity with the cold to frigid air masses in Siberia, extreme lows are recorded in wintertime; sometimes well below -20 C (-4 F). Its extreme inland position, virtually in the very heartland of Asia and thousands of kilometers from any open body of water, accounts for the cold character of its nights even during summertime.
A vast alluvial fan between the Kunlun and Altun mountain ranges forming the southern border of the Taklamakan Desert, the left side appearing blue from water flowing in many streams. There is very little water in the desert and it is hazardous to cross. Merchant caravans on the Silk Road would stop for relief at the thriving oasis towns.
The key oasis towns, watered by rainfall from the mountains, were Kashgar, Marin, Niya, Yarkand, and Khotan (Hetian) to the south, Kuqa and Turpan in the north, and Loulan and Dunhuang in the east. Now many, such as Marin and Gaochang, are ruined cities in sparsely inhabited areas in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China.
The archeological treasures found in its sand-buried ruins point to Tocharian, early Hellenistic, Indian, and Buddhist influences. Its treasures and dangers have been vividly described by Aurel Stein, Sven Hedin, Albert von Le Coq, and Paul Pelliot. Mummies, some 4000 years old, have been found in the region. They show the wide range of peoples who have passed through. Some of the mummies appear European. Later, the Taklamakan was inhabited by Turkic peoples. Starting with the Tang Dynasty, the Chinese periodically extended their control to the oasis cities of the Taklamakan in order to control the important silk route trade across Central Asia. Periods of Chinese rule were interspersed with rule by Turkic, Mongol and Tibetan peoples. The present population consists largely of Turkic Uyghur people.