As well all know, the silk production is the main role along Silk Road. Different period, different countries, the silk production also arouse different features. However, about the silk history, there are storing many mysteries to unveil.

Commercial Silk Trading
The first silk workshops were set up during the Han Dynasty; from the Han capital, silk was traded as far as Antioch on the Mediterranean, and eventually onwards by sea to Rome, where laws were enforced to try to control overspreading on this luxury. By the beginning of the 3rd century, the Parthian Dynasty was making huge profits from customs duties levied on silk and other goods transported along the Silk Road. The Parthian was defeated in 224AD by the Sassanians, whose weavers developed their own highly distinctive silk designs. Since then, Chinese of Tang Dynasty began to imitate them. Preserved Tang silks display typically Sassanian designs, such as repeated registers of single or confronting birds or animals, often with a central tree or flowering element. Variations on this distinctive motif were echoed by Sogdian weavers I Central Asia.

Silk and Church
With the Silk Road becoming more and more prosperous at that time, there are many churches appeared. Silk Production and trade in Byzantium Christian Europe had a close connection with Church, and was closely regulated by government decree. Clerics wear silk garments and altar cloths were made of silk. At that time, sumptuary laws were important in maintaining the hierarchies of the imperial court and Church, and color and design were an integral part of silk symbolic status. Royal purple was the color of Byzantium, a silk-ruled empire, and the best was obtained by Syrian dye masters from the murex shellfish, an industry developed by the Phoenicians. Syrian silk merchants were always accorded special privileges by the Byzantines. Byzantine rulers are depicted wearing silk garments with huge patterns, roundels containing lions, eagles, mounted heroes and heroic images, whose origins echo even older Near Eastern image.

Silk Production Today
The first imperial silk workshops were established in Sichuan and Shandong. Three traditional Chinese silk-producing regions have retained importance but whereas once, vast mulberry orchards were needed to furnish supplies of fresh leaves to feed the voracious caterpillars, and production was restricted and seasonal. Now genetically modified bushes produce four consecutive harvests of fresh leaves.

Silk Road is full of mysterious and colors. It deserved your special attention!