Hsüan Tsang (ca. 602-664) was the most famous Chinese Buddhist pilgrim and traveler in India and a translator of Buddhist texts. His "Hsi-yü Chi," or "Record of Western Countries," remains an indispensable source book to students of 7th-century India and central Asia.

Hsüan Tsang, also spelled Hsüan Chuang, whose name is romanized in a wide variety of ways, is the Buddhist designation of the Chinese holy monk whose family name was Ch'en and personal name, Chen. He was born in Honan midway in the brief Sui dynasty (589-617), which represented the first successful attempt at reunifying the Chinese Empire since the end of the Han dynasty (220). The intervening centuries saw much chaos and suffering together with a phenomenal expansion of Buddhism. Hsüan Tsang followed the example of an elder brother and joined the Buddhist monastic order in Loyang at...