Islamic Frontiers of China

This is a reprint and updated monograph first published in 1990. The authors, Wong How Man and Adel Awni Dajani, have many marvelous photos and anecdotal tales to share with a general audience. The book opens with the Hadith, “Seek knowledge even if it is in China.” This is a wonderful starting point to a pictorial overview of the diversity of the Muslim communities that live along the Silk Road and Eastern China, namely Xinjiang and Qinghai.

The monograph is divided into three chapters and includes a preface. The three chapters are: ‘Ancient Trade Routes’; ‘Islam Comes to China’; ‘Personal Encounters’; ‘Outlook on Islam in China in the 21st Century.’ Each chapter has many merits, though, overall, it is the photographs that make this book a worthy addition to any library.

The photographs are spectacular in elucidating the vast terrain and diversity of the Silk Road to Eastern China. The photos depict the diversity of these communities, for example, the Uighurs in traditional dress, some of the mosques and the arts associated with the traditional madrasah complex such as Qur’anic manuscripts and the calligraphy associated with writing the Qur’an. Moreover, one notes the beautiful traditional carpet weavings, the markets where goods are bartered, Kazakh hunters with their birds of prey, the eagle, traditional housing, including Kirgiz yurts, and of course the diversity of the Arabic script in Chagatai and Arabic.