Wang Cunjin, 61, a farmer from a village in north China, never thought he would go abroad and help discover a lost ancient city, thousands of miles from home.
For the past two years, Wang has joined a Chinese archaeological team in Uzbekistan each fall and spent more than two months there digging at the Mingtepa ruins in the Fergana Valley.
His unique skill of digging underground with a traditional Chinese tool called a Luoyang shovel has amazed local archaeologists, who have less experience doing archaeological work where there are no signs on the ground surface.
The joint archaeological team from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) and its Uzbekistan counterpart has made significant finds as they unearthed an ancient city, almost the size of Monaco.
They found that about 2,000 years ago, Mingtepa was an important city in the Dayuan state, a state known for the precious Fergana horse breed and a key hub on the ancient Silk Road.
Chinese President Xi Jinping mentioned the joint archaeological work last June, when he published a signed article in Uzbek media ahead of his state visit to the Central Asian country.
"The State Administration of Cultural Heritage of China, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and the Northwest University of China have worked actively with Uzbekistan on joint archaeological research and restoration, making important contributions to restoring the historical sites of the Silk Road," Xi wrote.
This January, the project won a Major Overseas Archaeological Discovery of 2016 award from the CASS.
SEEKING A BREAKTHROUGH
The ancient Silk Road was a conduit for trade and exchange about 2,000 years ago. It is drawing more attention nowadays, as the Belt and Road Initiative was proposed by China in 2013 as a trade and infrastructure network to better connect Asia with Europe and Africa.
China will host the Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation on May 14 and 15 in Beijing.
"Culture exchange and cooperation consist an important part of the Belt and Road Initiative," said Chen Xingcan, director of the Institute of Archaeology with the CASS. "Evidence from the archaeological work will help countries along the ancient route learn more about the history."
Today, Chinese and foreign archaeologists are teaming up to rediscover the history in the ancient Silk Road.
The Mingtepa ruins have seen intermittent excavations for decades. Part of the city walls have been unearthed, circling an area 500 meters by 800 meters.
But there have been guesses that the city could be larger and there were undiscovered outer walls.
