Eolian activity in arid areas can result in global-scale climate change as well as severely disrupt regional human activities. The Tarim Basin,located in the interior of Asia,is one of the regions with the strongest eolian activity in the world. However,high resolution records of late Quaternary eolian activity in this area are relatively scarce. Here we present the results of grain-size based regional eolian activity reconstructions from the Bosten Lake in the Yanqi Basin,Xinjiang,NW China. The sediment core,BH08B,was drilled in the southeastern part of Bosten Lake,which is surrounded by sand dunes and is isolated from fluvial influence. As two usually used methods of environment dynamics in arid area,the grain size-standard deviation curves and end-menmber models extracted grainsize sensitive component 2 (>19.35 mum) and end-member 2 and 3 were used to reconstruct the history of eolian activity over the past nearly 2 000 years. The grain-size sensitive component 2 (>19.35 mum) and end-member 2 and 3 extracted by grain size-standard deviation curves and end-member models should relate to eolian activities in this region,and the two proxies were used to reconstruct the history of eolian activity over the past nearly 2000 years. The results indicate the periods 280-410 AD and 1320-1800 AD were characterized by the most intense eolian activity. Conversely the period 410-1320 AD was characterized by the weakest eolian activity. However,70- 280 AD and since 1800 AD,eolian activity was also very low with few distinct accretionary episodes. On the basis of comparisons with independent climate records,phases of intense eolian activity mainly occurred during cold,dry climatic conditions,whilst weak eolian activity corresponded to relatively warm and humid climatic condition. The variable of temperature was found to provide highest explanation for intensity of eolian processes. Lower temperatures likely resulted in a strengthening of the Siberian High (SH) and then strengthen the ground wind when SH breaking out in spring accordingly. It is worth noting that the stronger eolian activity during 280-410 AD recorded in the Bosten Lake may have led to the abandonment of the ancient city of Loulan on the northern side of the Tarim Basin.