They are joined to the north by a belt of cultivated land stretching about 40 km from the town of Yecheng to the Yarkand River.

[8] It was noted for producing baicao (白草, literally "white grass") which gave a very poisonous substance used on arrow tips - probably from an aconite plant.

Xiye is recorded in the Book of the Later Han as being distinct from Zihe and having 2,500 households, more than 10,000 people and 3,000 men able to bear arms.

He added that the Mahayana canonical texts were more numerous here than in any other country Buddhism had reached.It apparently sent an embassy to China at the beginning of the Taiyan period (435-439 CE) and tribute was sent regularly after that.

After being freed, many slaves such as Gilgitis in Xinjiang cities like Tashkurgan, Yarkand and Karghallik, stayed rather than return Hunza in Gilgit.

A free man, Khas Muhammad, was married with two children to a female slave named Daulat, aged 24.

[12] In 1979, a number of religious schools were founded by militant group East Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM/TIP) founder Abdul Hakeem Makhdoom in Karghalik.

These were used to disseminate the movement's ideology among the local population, and were the place where Hasan Mahsum, who would later go on to revive and lead the militant group, studied from 1984 to 1989.

Chasa Meschit Township (Qiasameiqite, Qiasimiqiti) surrounds Kargilik Town on the north, east and south.

[1] As of 2019, Kargilik Town included fifty-two residential communities: (Mandarin Chinese pinyin-derived names)[15] As of 2009:[16] In earlier times it was important as the usual starting-point for caravans to India, through the Pamirs, via Tashkurghan, or through Ladakh by the Karakoram passes.