An image promoting the RAS Korea lecture by Simon Kaner and Susan Whitfield / Courtesy of RAS Korea

Two members of the Royal Asiatic Society (RAS) of Great Britain and Ireland are in Korea this week to give a lecture for Asian studies enthusiasts in Seoul.

Simon Kaner and Susan Whitfield will give a talk on May 9 titled "Changing Landscapes Across the Silk Roads," looking at the effect on "all aspects of life and landscape of the new religions at the edges of the Silk Roads."

Although the RAS is synonymous here with Korean studies, its local branch, RAS Korea, is still merely an affiliate of the central organization. The original RAS was founded in 1823, with a focus mainly on the Indian subcontinent. However, its purview extends all across Asia and into North Africa and Ethiopia.

RAS Korea, founded in 1900, is one of several regional branches of RAS, alongside the RAS of Sri Lanka, RAS Hong Kong, the Asiatic Society of Japan, the Malaysian Branch of the RAS, the Asiatic Society of Bangladesh and RAS China.

Korea, while never part of the British Empire, was connected to the Silk Roads, a network of trade routes stretching across Europe and Asia. Artifacts from the Roman Empire have been discovered in archaeological sites for Korea's ancient Silla Kingdom (57 BCE–935 CE), and silk from Silla was found in Rome.

Kaner and Whitfield are part of Nara to Norwich, an international, collaborative research project founded in 2016 by the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures (SISJAC) at the University of East Anglia.

Their aim is to "explore the Silk Roads beyond their current limits of the Chinese and post-Roman worlds" and the "interactions between early Buddhism in east Asia and early Christianity around the North Sea ... to weave a narrative concerning the transformation of religions as they journeyed eastwards to Nara in Japan and westwards to Norwich in Britain."

For this lecture, Kaner will introduce the project and discuss changing Buddhist landscapes, and Whitfield will look more broadly at the history and influence of the Silk Roads.

"As Buddhism moved east from north India and Christianity moved west from the shores of the Mediterranean, both religions took with them new forms of art, architecture and worship," they said in an online invitation.

Kaner is an archaeologist of early Japan and director of SISJAC. Whitfield is a historian of medieval China and the Silk Roads. She is a professor of Silk Road studies at SISJAC and was previously curator of Dunhuang manuscripts at the British Library.

The lecture starts at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday. Entry costs 10,000 won or 5,000 won for students, and is free for RAS Korea members. Visit raskb.com for more information, including the lecture venue.