Amazing Wonders of Afghanistan

By Jonathan Lee

1 of the best writings in this field

Afghanistan is a Central Asia country with an estimated population of some thirty million people. Over fifty languages are spoken in the country, which reflects the diverse cultural backgrounds of this nation’s people and history. As a result of invasion and migration over many centuries, Afghanistan has a rich and ancient heritage which includes influences from northern India, Mongolia, Greece, Iran, Arabia and China. Afghanistan, whilst today predominantly Muslim, has also historically been an important centre of world religions, including Buddhist, Zoroastrianism and Christianity.
This diversity is also reflected in Afghanistan extensive archaeological heritage which include the Buddhist images of Bamiyan and the Minaret of Jam, both of which are UNESCO World Heritage sites. Over the last two centuries archaeologists have also made many important discoveries which have rewritten the history of the region.
Afghanistan also has a history of civil conflict and invasion. Over the past forty years, in particular, this has had a devastating effect on the country’s heritage.
“Amazing Wonders of Afghanistan” aims to celebrate a few of Afghanistan’s most important cultural heritage sites as well as a several key cultural festivals and traditions. The book provides an overview of each site or cultural icon whilst highlighting the challenges faced by war, neglect, pillaging and uncontrolled development.
Dr. Jonathan Lee, the author of this book, is a well-known historian with extensive experience of living and travelling in Afghanistan. He is the author of numerous works on Afghanistan’s history, culture heritage and archaeology.
This book provides an excellent introduction to Afghanistan’s rich and diverse cultural heritage. Each of the twenty articles is well illustrated and includes a short bibliography at the end of each entry to encourage further reading.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Dec 15, 2015
• ISBN: 9789936802049

Book preview

Amazing Wonders of Afghanistan

By Jonathan Lee

Amazing Wonders of Afghanistan 

Author:         Jonathan Lee

Date:             2014

Email:            [e-mail] 

e-PUB:           Mohammad Hassan Ibraimi

ISBN: 978-9936-8020-4-9

Copyright © Rahmat Publications, Afghanistan, 2011 

In the Name of God

Contents

Praise for Amazing Wonders of Afghanistan

Introduction

Ai Khanum

Babur’s Gardens

The Bala Hisar

Bamiyan’s Buddhist Heritage

Band-i Amir

Buzkashi

The 'Minars' of the Logar Valley

Gul-i Surkh

Istalif

Karez, an Ancient Irrigation System

Afghanistan’s Blue Gold

Monuments of Mediaval Herat

Minaret of Jam

Monuments of Ghazni

Old Kandahar

Royal Paghman

Windmills of Herat and Sistan

The Salang Tunnel

Surkh Kotal and the Kushans

Tela Tepa

Praise for Amazing Wonders of Afghanistan

"A most valuable work on ancient sites, historical monuments and natural wonders of Afghanistan. One of the best writings in this field.

These sites and monuments, actually a heritage of the world, have suffered much damage and ruin over the centuries due to neglect and cowardly vandalism and pillage. The Ministry of Culture and Information has documented over 1200 historical sites and monuments. The survival of these sites is a serious concern for anyone committed to culture and civilization.

This valuable and well-researched work will be very helpful for the Ministry of Culture to introduce and highlight Afghanistan’s historical monuments and cultural concerns. The author is well-qualified for this task. Basing his work on professional research, he has highlighted the multifaceted aspects of many of Afghanistan’s sites and monuments. This book will also be a useful source of research for anyone seeking information about our history and culture, especially for our young generation, as well as those in the international community interested in Afghan history and culture. 

On behalf of the Ministry of Culture and Information as well as the cultural community of Afghanistan, I give tribute to Jonathan Lee and Rahmat Publications for this valuable work." 

The Honorable Minister, Raheen Makhtoon, 

(Minister of Information and Culture, Kabul, Afghanistan)

A sweeping, imaginatively illustrated historical visit in time and space that moves from the northeast to the south depicting sites, monuments, scenic spots, villages, festivals, sports, crafts and customs. This dip into a singularly rich culture brings to life Afghanistan from the 4th century BCE down to the present. 

Nancy Dupree 

(Director of Afghanistan Center at Kabul University and author of numerous works on the history and archaeology of Afghanistan)

This important volume provides a succinct and perceptive overview of a cross-section of significant historic sites in Afghanistan and will be invaluable for Afghan and international readers alike. The work not only serves as a timely reminder of the richness of the country's rich built heritage but of the threats that many sites continue to face due to neglect, official indifference and ill-conceived 'development'. 

Jolyon Leslie, 

Co-founder of the Society for the Preservation of Afghanistan's Cultural Heritage (SPACH) and now works with its successor, the Afghan Cultural Heritage Consulting Organization (ACHCO). He is a member of the Senior Advisory Board of the Global Heritage Fund.

Introduction 

Afghanistan’s diverse and ancient cultural heritage is well known and has led many authors to refer to the country as ‘The Crossroads of Asia’, ‘The Crossroads of Civilisations’, ‘The Heart of Asia’ and so on.  ‘Crossroads’ of course could be applied to many countries which, like Afghanistan, straddle ancient trade and invasion routes. What makes Afghanistan’s cultural heritage particularly special, however, is the sheer diversity of the country’s cultural history and archaeology and the fact that it encompasses such a huge breadth of human history. It is a history which begins with some of the earliest known human activity in the Late Palaeolithic era of the Stone Age (c. 30,000 BCE).

Afghanistan’s cultural heritage reflects millennia of interaction with the cultures, philosophies and peoples of northern India, Inner Asia, China, Persia, the Near East and even Graeco-Roman Europe. These influences are due to a variety of factors. Commerce along Eurasia’s network of trade routes known, misleadingly, as ‘The Silk Road’ (there were many ‘routes’ and silk was came late in the story of Eurasian trade) was a major spur to both cultural and ideological interchange from at least the early Bronze Age. Voluntary and involuntary migration has also contributed to making Afghanistan something of an ethnic melting pot. Invasion and colonisation by external powers have also been major factors promoting cultural interaction whilst new philosophies were also brought to the country by religious refugees, missionaries and pilgrims. Over the millennia Kabul, Ghazni, Herat, Kandahar, Bamiyan, Bagram, Firoz Koh (near Chaghcharan in Ghur) and Balkh, to mention the most important, were all at one time capitals of major empires. These varieties of cultural influences are today reflected in the great variety of cultural heritage as well as in the multi-ethnic composition of Afghanistan’s society and the fact that over fifty different languages are spoken in the country.

Yet unlike Egypt, the ‘Fertile Cresent’ or the Tirgis-Euphrates region, Afghanistan is still regarded by archaeologists as very much terra incognito (‘unknown land’). The Bamiyan Buddhas, for example, though mentioned by Chinese pilgrim in the seventh century BCE, were not sketched by European explorers until the 1830s. The Minaret of Jam remained undocumented until 1957, whilst excavations at Ai Khanum, the famous Hellenistic city on the Amu Darya, only began in 1964. Indeed, one of the things that first attracted me to Afghanistan as an undergraduate was the fact that so little was known about the country and its cultural heritage. 

Afghanistan still continues to produce remarkable discoveries, discoveries which often force scholars to rewrite the history of whole eras. They include the earliest known Buddhist religious texts; a cache (or genizah) of early mediaeval Hebrew manuscripts; the Tela (Tellya) Tepe treasure; the Rabatak Bactrian inscription; the monumental Sasanid rock carving outside Pul-i Khumri, and excavations by French archaeologists at Chashma-yi Shafa, south of Balkh, at a site which is more than likely the location of the ancient city of Bactra. Many areas of the country remain unsurveyed and will probably be so for the foreseeable future.

This present work gives an introduction to a selection of Afghanistan’s most remarkable architectural and archaeological heritage. The selection of subjects has been far from easy and inevitably there have had to be omissions. Thus there is no mention of the Gandharan heritage of Begram or Hadda, nor of Noh Gunbad, Afghanistan’s earliest mosque near Balkh or the many ancient monuments which are scattered throughout the Sistan, or the Ghaznavid ruins at Bost.

The criteria for choosing the twenty sites which appear in this book is based on a desire to represent as wide a variety of cultural and artistic influences as possible and to span a period from the early historic era to late medieval Islamic one. The choice also reflects the cultural heritage from all regions of Afghanistan. Two chapters deal with national cultural traditions, buzkashi and the New Year’s Festival known as Gul-i Surkh, which today are very much part of Afghanistan’s identity. 

Another reason for writing this book is to highlight the crisis facing Afghanistan’s material culture and at least one chapter, the Minars of the Logar Valley, is a valedictory, a memorial to a series of unique and little documented monuments which are now lost forever. One of the inescapable themes which occur in almost every chapter is the threat facing the country’s cultural heritage. It is a silent and mostly unpublicised disaster but one of unprecedented proportions which, were it happening in any European or North American nation, would lead to popular demands for immediate and urgent government action. 

Over the last thirty years war damage, both direct and indirect, has had a devastating effect on Afghanistan’s cultural heritage. And whilst the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas is the most well-known act of war-related vandalism, many other monuments have suffered greatly and are now on the ‘at risk’ list and in need of immediate consolidation work. Hand-in-hand with decades of civil unrest has been a loss of ‘ownership’, or understanding of the intrinsic cultural and social value of the nation’s cultural heritage. For some this heritage is seen purely in monetary terms, a world view which has led to the widespread pillaging of archaeological sites and the on-sale of undocumented artefacts to foreign dealers and private collectors overseas. 

The influx of millions of dollars into the economy by foreign donors and military since 2002 has led to an unprecedented boom in major construction projects, urban redevelopment and expansion. In the process of this unprecedented drive for modernisation, historic structures have been torn down and many archaeological sites have been bulldozed, including what is probably the site of the ancient city of Bactra. This is not to argue against ‘progress’, but rather that the rules which donor countries uphold within their own nations and which require proper documentation and preservation of sites of major cultural significance, ought to be equally applied to work carried out in Afghanistan too.

My hope is that this book will in a small way raise more awareness of the current crisis and hopefully encourage Afghans to take pride in their heritage and to seek practical ways to preserve what remains.

Jonathan Lee

New Zealand January 2014

Acknowledgments

A number of people have contributed to this work, in particular Dr Arley Loewen who first suggested the idea for such a book and has overseen the editorial process. Warwick Ball FSA; Prof. Frantz Grenet of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Paris; St John Simpson, Assistant Keeper, Middle East Dept., British Museum; Dr. Llewelyn Morgan, Brasenose College, Oxford; Prof. Nicholas Sims-Williams, of the School of Oriental and African Studies, London, and Jolyon Leslie esq., advisor to the Afghan Cultural Heritage Consulting Organisation (ACHCO) have all contributed their advice on various aspects of the research. Thanks are also due to Warwick Ball, Jolyon Leslie, David Adams and the Trustees of the British Museum for permission to use their images royalty free.  I cannot thank my wife, Kathy Carter-Lee, enough. She has been a constant source of inspiration and encouragement throughout this, and many other projects as well as helped with the proof-reading.

Biography of Dr. Jonathan Lee

Jonathan Lee is an independent British scholar with more than forty years of involvement in Afghanistan. He first visited the country in 1971 whilst an undergraduate at the University of Leeds. After graduating he studied Persian language and literature in Kabul University and taught English with the British Council. As a Fellow of the British Institute of Afghan Studies, he conducted field research in northern Afghanistan on shrines and non-formal religious culture. Since 1992 Dr Lee has travelled extensively in remote regions of Afghanistan conducting field research and archaeological reconnaissance. He has also worked as a consultant with various development agencies in Afghanistan and Pakistan.