Christopher Wilton-Steer A version of this article appears in print on July 27, 2025, Page 22 of the Sunday Book Review with the headline: Up Close / ‘The Silk Road,’ by Christopher Wilton-Steer.

The Silk Road was the first great globalization scheme. From 130 B.C. to 1453 A.D., ideas, goods, cultures, and religions flowed between this overland trade route connecting the Far East, China ...

There cannot be many international crime leaders inspired by “The Princess Bride”, a cult children’s fantasy movie released in 1987. Ross Ulbricht, the founder of the Silk Road, the very ...

Ulbricht operated the anonymous digital marketplace known as Silk Road when law enforcement arrested him. The pardon fulfills a campaign pledge Trump made to Ulbricht's Libertarian supporters.

Silk Road was once synonymous with online “dark web” criminal activity, and today, its number two organizer, Roger Thomas Clark, aka Variety Jones, was sentenced to 20 years. Clark’s ...