The Sogdian Letters: Spies, Exile, and a Desert Fortress

Trade Routes That Changed Human History Forever — Fexingo History · May 25, 2026 · 7m · transcript

Episode 55 of Trade Routes That Changed Human History Forever takes us deep into the Sogdian Letters — five extraordinary documents discovered in a watchtower near Dunhuang. Written in the early fourth century by Sogdian merchants trapped by civil war, these letters reveal a world of spies, abandoned caravans, and desperate pleas for rescue. We trace the story of Nanai-Vandak, a merchant whose letter to his trading partner in Samarkand describes the sack of Luoyang by Xiongnu warlords, the burning of the Chinese capital, and the collapse of trade routes that had linked East and West for…