South of the road from Kandahar to Herat, at the confluence of the Rivers Helmund and Arghandab, a vast area of ruins stretching for more than 4 miles along the Helmand marks the ancient city of Bost (Kala-i Bost) and the winter residence of the Ghaznavid sultans, the palaces of Lashkar-i Bazar. Like Ghazna, Bost was first devastated by the Ghorid Sultan Ala-ud Din in 1151, rebuilt and then destroyed again by the Mongols of Chingiz-Khan. At the close of the fourteenth century, the site and its environs were yet again devasted by Timur, who destroyed one of the great dams across the Helmand that contained the head of water that served to irrigate all the western lands of Sistan.
The citadel of Bost commands an impressive view over the neighbouring countryside, littered far into the steppe with remnants of clay walls and ruined buildings. At the foot of the citadel mound, an elegant arch with an 82ft span was probably constructed as a triumphal entrance to the city. Built originally in the late Ghaznavid period, it was heavily restored in the 1950s; when, despite this, it began to show conspicuous cracks, the Afghan authorities decided to wall it up (1978). It is, or rather was, a graceful, slightly pointed structure of baked bricks, decorated on the inside with geometrical ornaments and on the outside, both on the arch and on the supporting columns, with inscription bands in flowering Kufic. On either side, a horseshoe-shaped blind arch is filled with a simple geometrical ornament in baked brick. Although some sources place it to the eleventh century, the character of its décor points to a somewhat later date. The horseshoe arches were probably inspired by India.
The Arabic Al-Askar (Camp) has become a Persian Lashkargah (Soldiers’ Place) or Lashkar-i Bazar (Soldier’s Bazaar). It is a group of three palaces at the north end of the site, on the bank of the Helmand, with courtyards, gardens and a number of auxiliary structures inside a walled enclosure. It was discovered in 1948 by the French archaeological mission, and excavated in five successive campaigns concentrating mainly on the southern palace, the largest of the three. Parts of this palace can be dated to the end of the tenth century, but it seems to have been completed by about 1036. If this is correct, the construction was begun by Mahmud and finished by his son Masud I.
A straight avenue about a third of a mile long provided access to the palace from the south. It was obviously the main shopping street, for it was lined on both sides with shops and stalls, of which about 100 have been uncovered. The site of the palace is over 1,650ft long. The southern part of it was occupied by a vast rectangular forecourt surrounded by a wall. On one side was a large mosque with a 284ft frontage and a portal of 35ft, built probably in the time of Mahmud and Masud I. On the north side of this forecourt was the entrance to the palace, an iwan leading to a spacious vestibule in the form of a cross through which the centre of the palace was reached. This centre was a vast rectangular courtyard, 208ft by 162ft, with an iwan in the middle of each side.
The northern iwan was larger and higher than all the others, and gave access to the audience hall and other public buildings. Private apartments were in the corners, each grouped around a smaller private courtyard. A canal passed through the audience hall and the adjacent rooms, carrying running water across the entire width of the palace. Toilets and bathrooms, as well as water tanks, were fed from it. The water was lifted into it by some kind of mechanism, but the source of the water has not been found. A small mosque richly decorated with stucco ornaments was discovered in 1950 inside the great audience hall.9
The façade facing the forecourt was decorated in carved stucco. The entrance iwan had a terracotta decoration, panels with geometrical ornaments and bands of inscriptions, dating from the middle or late twelfth century. The walls of the audience hall were lavishly decorated, in the lower parts with wall paintings, higher up with geometrical ornaments in baked brick. On the wall facing the entrance were two large panels framed with inscriptions and filled with carved stucco ornament in the same style as the arch of Bost. On the inside of the entrance iwan were hexagonal ornaments and calligraphic bands in elongated Kufic.
The wall paintings have been removed and placed in the Kabul Museum. Remnants have been found of some forty-four figures, out of a total of perhaps sixty, all clad in ceremonial robes in lively colours and carrying insignia of rank. It is assumed that they depicted the sultan’s guard of Turkish slaves. Schlumberger10 finds traces of Buddhist and Sasanian traditions in this decoration. The costumes indicate Chinese Turkestan, with a marked influence of the steppe nomads. The depiction on the walls of a procession of palace guards was an ancient habit of Oriental rulers that can be traced back to Persepolis and Susa.
* * *
NOTES ON CHAPTER XIX
Full details of abbreviations and publications are in the Bibliography
1 Bosworth, C.K., The Ghaznavids, p.33.
2 Bosworth, C.K., The Ghaznavids, p.134.
3 Bosworth, C.K., The Ghaznavids, p.139.
4 Bosworth, C.K., The Ghaznavids, p.135.
5 Sourdel-Thomine, Deux minarets, p.108.
6 Duprée, L., Afghanistan, p.268.
7 Whitehouse, D., ‘Excavations at Kandahar, 1974’, Afghan Studies, I, 1978.
8 McNicoll, A., ‘Excavations at Kandahar, 1975’, Afghan Studies, I, 1978.
9 Schlumberger, D., ‘Le palais ghaznevide de Lashkari Bazar’, Syria, XXX, 1952.
10 Schlumberger, ‘Le palais’, Syria, XXX, 1952.
APPENDIX
AFTERMATH OF DESTRUCTION
For twenty years the outside world knew next to nothing of the state and preservation of the sites and monuments in Afghanistan. It was only in March 2000 that two articles published simultaneously in the French magazine Archeologia shed some light on the state of at least a limited number of them.
The National Museum of Kabul seems to have survived the Soviet occupation rather well but had the misfortune to find itself in the firing line between the warring factions in the civil war. It was hit by an anti-tank rocket, caught fire and partially burned down. Some 80 per cent of its collections were either destroyed or subsequently looted. Disappeared, among other things, some 30,000 coins, the famous ivories of Begram and other priceless treasures, including the gold artefacts from Tilla-Tepe.
The recent political situation in the country gravely affected the Bamiyan Buddhas. First, some caves at the base of the large Buddha were used for the storage of arms and ammunition. The concrete supports of the statue were demolished to retrieve metal bracing. Frescoes above the head were destroyed or looted during the fights between the Taliban and the Hazara. One large fresco covered with soot was spattered with shoe prints in white paint. The Small Buddha had his head blown off in 1999, and his head and neck were turned to rubble. Half of the draperies in the upper part of the body have disappeared; there was a gaping hole in the lower part of the body visible from afar, but this seemed to be of an earlier date. Explosions damaged the right knee, the galleries and the staircase around the statue and almost all frescoes behind the head seem to have disappeared between 1995 and 1999. Both statues were finally blown up in March 2001.
A search was going for some time for a statue of a reclining Buddha, mentioned in some sources, but none was found. Since 2003, repairs of the niches were sporadically undertaken, fissures were filled in etc. Fragments of statues made it possible to date the ‘small’ Buddha statue to AD 500, and the large one to AD 550. However, UNESCO decided not to reconstruct the statues.1
Although the museum itself was bombed, destroyed and looted, the gold treasure of Tilla Tepe, some of the gold objects and ivories and coins, were found in 2003 in the underground vault of the National Bank. The key to the vault was lost and some sealed tin containers found there could only be opened later. Nevertheless, some stolen objects from the museum still appear on the world art markets and auctions. Despite this some renowned museums in Europe and North America and now the British Museum were able to mount an impressive exhibition of artefacts that remained or were recovered.
The legs and supports of the Kakrak Buddha wer
e destroyed in 1996. The minaret of Jam is in danger of collapsing because of the water of the Hari Rud lapping at its base. Rescue operations decided on by UNESCO in 1974 have not been carried out. Some work may have started at the end of 1999 in much more difficult conditions.
In Herat, the Buddhist monastery of Tapa-i Shotor (third to fourth century), which was one of the finest monuments of Graeco-Buddhist art, was established before the occupation as the first museum in situ in Afghanistan. In 1982 it was destroyed.
Among other sites that were damaged, the site of Tela-i Tepe has undergone extensive pillage, and was even dug up by bulldozers. The twelfth-century madrasa Shah-i Mashad, a masterpiece of Ghorid architecture and decoration, was completely destroyed. The Buddhist column, Minar-i Chakri, south-east of Kabul, collapsed in 1998 for lack of maintenance. More than half of the city of Kabul has been turned into ‘a lunar landscape’ in the factional fighting of 1994–5.
* * *
NOTES ON APPENDIX
1 UNESCO decision, Archéologia 487/11.
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Abbreviations
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BSOAS Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, London
CAR Central Asian Review, London
IESB Indo-European Studies Bulletin, Berkeley
Mém. DAFA Memoires de la Délegation Archeologique Française en Afghanistan, Paris
JA Joumal Asiatique, Paris
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