There are two major viewpoints in Chinese academic circles concerning the date of the eastward export of Xijiang Hotan jade to the hinterland. One of them believes that Hotan was an important source of raw jade in ancient China, especially in times after the Han Emperor Wudi opening the road to the Western Regions, but the question of when this eastward export was begun can not be solved for the time being. The other theory goes that Hotan jade began to be spread to the hinterland long before the Western Han period. According to available archaeological data, a number of Yin-and-Zhou tombs have yielded jades made of raw material from Hotan and other producing areas in Xinjiang, which suggests that as early as the Yin-and-Zhou period long before the road to the Western Region was opened, a lot of areas in China hinterland had imported jade from Hotan and many other places of Xinjiang. The objects made of Xinjiang jade unearthed from the Fu Hao tomb are far not the only evidence of this understanding.
