The question of certain groups of “Chinese” being distantly related to ancient wanderers from as far west as Europe is one of those subjects in the China history field that, like mildew in the bath or a chip in the car’s windshield, seems a matter of minor importance is both omnipresent and vaguely troubling. In 1998, the PBS series Nova did a piece on a group of mummies at a museum in Urumchi with distinctly ‘caucasian’ features. The long reddish-blond hair and European features of the preserved bodies convinced some scholars that an ancient settlement existed in the Takla Makan desert that was a kind of crossroads between Europe and Asia.
Today the Telegraph is reporting from Gansu, “Residents of a remote Chinese village [Liqian] are hoping that DNA tests will prove one of history’s most unlikely legends — that they are descended from Roman legionaries lost in antiquity.” Villagers are born with blonde locks and reddish wavy hair. Their skin is ruddy and their facial features…how to put this…look vaguely Roman. Richard Spencer writes:
The town’s link with Rome was first suggested by a professor of Chinese history at Oxford in the 1950s. Homer Dubs pulled