Many of us know Tang Sanzang, the fictional Chinese Buddhist monk and pilgrim who is a central character in the 16th-century novel Journey to the West. He is based on the real Chinese Buddhist monk, Xuanzang.
Xuanzang was one of many monks from ancient China, dated common era year 0602.
There was another monk, 鸠摩罗什 (Jiū mó luó shén), Kumārajīva, dated common era year 0344, known for translation of Buddhist texts written in Sanskrit to Chinese language.
Kumārajīva's translations were very influential on the development of Buddhist Chinese and they introduced much commonly used terminology, such as:
大乘; Dà chéng, or "greater vehicle", for the Sanskrit term Mahāyāna
念處; niàn chǔ for Smṛtyupasthāna (placement of mindfulness)
菩提; pú tí for Bodhi (awakening)
性; xìng for Dhatū (nature, source)
Some of the sutra which we heard of were translated by him and his team members.
All of them are scholars and travellers with mission.
Getting information was not an easy task during acient time. We are considered lucky and could even create new sutra using A.I.:
The Artificiala-Intelligenca-
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Tales from the Silk Road
