Production: the development of sericulture and interacting with the natural environment -- Trade: negotiations between central governments and local societies -- Fashion: the desire for luxury silk, the color red, and foreignness -- Regulation: sumptuary laws and the decline of the traditional...

The Silk Roads were a decentralized network of trade routes that connected ancient cities across Eurasia. Goods, ideas, people, and technology moved along the roads for over 1,500 years. Using a detailed georeferenced map of the entire trade network, this paper finds that areas within 50 KM of...