Quiz question for Aug 2nd, 2009

That was interesting B, but far from easy for me :) Since I wont be online later, I am posting my question early. Enjoy!


The boundaries chosen for continents have always been unsettling to me. Were they meant to delineate changes in civilisational scope, of geographical or climatic changes or ethnicities and cultures of the people who inhabit them? Or perhaps they're just an exercise in eurocentrism? Asia being largest and most unwieldy of them all seems especially disjoint. Asians look as different from each other as from any of their extra-continental cousins. The cuisines, the climate, culture and language families are widely different in the middle east, north&central asia, south asia, northeast and southeast asia. Today's question draws on what I think would would be a basis of a pan-asian (well, at least a larger part of asia than other ideas I can think of) identity.

Today's answer (A) is a place that flourished in the past, but is in ruins today. It played host to two of the greatest thinkers of what Karl Jaspers called the axial age (800BCE -200BCE). Although it was established long before, A was thickly populated and received wide royal patronage only starting 5th century ACE, when it can be said to have entered its golden period. Although it was laid waste twice, first by the huns in the 5th century and again by a southern asault a century and half later, it was restored both times to its former glory. But, with time came inevitable decay which was precipitated in 1197ACE by turkic invaders who destroyed it a third, and to date, final time. It is said that the lack of a copy of the koran within its famed confines invited their special ire. Although there is a lack of much written records from A itself, a scholar from the Tang dynasty and a Persian historian later have documented the glory and destruction of A respectively. Although the ruins were re-discovered in the 19th century, it is only recently that there has been a serious proposal among a host of Asian countries led by Singapore and including Japan, China and India to revive A's traditions. Identify the location of A and its relevance.

Other ideas that can be a basis of asian solidarity are obviously welcome in comments!! Although I won't forbid googling explicitly, let's make that a last resort...