Strikingly well-preserved mummies, tall in stature and fair in complexion, have lain in the parched Tarim Basin of western China for 3,800 years. Wearing Western-influenced textiles and possessing surprising technologies and customs, the identity of these extraordinary people has remained a mystery.

This exhibition of 150 objects drawn from the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region Museum and the Xinjiang Institute of Archaeology in Urumqi, China, reveals surprising details about the people who lived along the ancient Silk Road. For the first time ever, two of the more than 100 Caucasian mummies found and preserved in the western China’s inhospitable desert sands will be on display in the United States.