September 30, 2016

11:30am Thomson Hall 317

9th century shipwreck and its implications for the history of tea

Professor Victor H. Mair has been teaching at the University of Pennsylvania since 1979. He specializes in Buddhist popular literature as well as the vernacular tradition of Chinese fiction and the performing arts. Professor Mair discusses the Belitung shipwreck, a prominent theme in his co-authored book “The True History of Tea”. The shipwreck yielded the biggest single collection of Tang dynasty artifacts ever found in one location and a priceless insight window into the history of tea of China and the world during the early 9th Century.

Throughout the 1990’s, Professor Mair organized an interdisciplinary research project on the Bronze Age and Iron Age mummies of Eastern Central Asia. Among other results of his efforts during this period were three documentaries for television (Scientific American, NOVA and Discovery Channel), a major international conference, numerous articles, and a book, “The Tarim Mummies: Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West” (Thames and Hudson, 2000).

Co-sponsored by the Seattle Art Museum.