The ruins of a Buddhist temple dating back 1,500 years ago have
been discovered in China's largest desert, offering valuable
research material for historians studying Buddhism's spread from
India to China. As one of the largest sand deserts in the world,
the Taklimakan Desert covers an area of 330,000 square
kilometers and houses numerous ancient ruins. [File photo] The
temple's main hall, with a rare structure based around three
square-shaped corridors and a huge Buddha statue - now missing -
has been uncovered after two months of hard work in Xinjiang
Uygur Autonomous Region, Dr Wu Xinhua, the leading archaeologist
of the excavation project, said yesterday. "The hall is the
largest of its kind found in the Taklimakan Desert since the
first archaeologist came to the area in the 20th century," said
Wu, also head of the Xinjiang archeological team of the Chinese
Academy of Social Sciences. The ruins are in the south of the
Taklimakan Desert, in the Tarim Basin, known as the Damago Oasis
in the ancient kingdom