The survivors of Carrhae were enslaved and dragged into the interior of the Empire. One Roman writer even reported that the Parthians found a Roman soldier who looked like Crassus and paraded him around Parthia in a dress. But what happened to them next is a source of historical debate. The best guess is that they were deported to the far eastern border with China and forced to help guard against attacks by the Huns. There are no Roman sources that tell us what exactly happened to them. But if some historians are correct, they did eventually turn up again in Chinese histories.
In 36 BC, about 20 years after the battle of Carrhae, a Chinese army captured a city in what is now Uzbekistan from the Huns. The Chinese had been fighting steppe nomads like the Huns for generations, so this wasn’t a particularly unusual event. But at this battle, the Chinese witnessed something strange enough that they felt it was worth mentioning in the official history. Apparently, they encountered a type of enemy soldier that they had never seen before… an enemy that fought in a testudo formation.
The Chinese captured 145 of these foreign soldiers after the battle and were so impressed with their skill that they asked them to enlist in their own army. They then settled these soldiers on the border with Tibet in a city that they named Li-Jien. Some historians have noted that the word Li-Jien sounds like the Chinese pronunciation of “legion,” which might be a clue about the identity of the soldiers they settled there. And there’s some genetic evidence that might back that idea up.
Even today, the people in the area around Li-Jien have distinctly European features such as blonde hair and blue or green eyes. And genetic testing has revealed that close to two-thirds of their DNA is caucasian. That fact raises the tantalizing possibility that these people the descendants of the lost legionaries from Carrhae. It’s possible that the Romans found themselves fighting for the Parthians before being captured by Huns and forced to fight the Chinese before finally settling in China. But most of the evidence for this theory is a little spotty.
After all, Li-Jien is on the border of the steppes of Central Asia, where groups of people from Asia and Europe have mingled for thousands of years. And Li-Jien isn’t the only place in China where you might find people with Caucasian features. Archeological evidence from the area has revealed some interesting finds, like a crane that was used in Rome to build fortifications but wasn’t used in China. But that too is circumstantial evidence. One day, genetic testing and archaeology may reveal the truth. But until then, the legendary lost legions in China will have to remain a legend.