The Future Of The Bamiyan Buddha Statues

This Open Access book explores heritage conservation ethics of post conflict and provides an important historical record of the possible reconstruction of the Bamiyan Buddha statues, which was inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage List in Danger in 2003 as “Cultural Landscape and Archaeological Remains of the Bamiyan Valley”. With the condition that most surface of the original fragments of the Buddha statues were lost due to acts of deliberate destruction, this publication explores a reference point for conservation practitioners and policy makers around the world as they consider how to respond to on-going acts of destruction of cultural heritage. Whilst there has been an emerging debate to the ethics and nature of heritage reconstruction, this volume provides a plethora of ideas and approaches concerning the future treatment of the Bamiyan Buddha statues. It also addresses a number of fundamental questions on potential heritage reconstruction: how it will be done; who will decide; and what it should be done for. Moreover when it comes to the inscribed World Heritage properties, how can reconstructed heritage using non-original materials be considered to retain authenticity? With a view to serving as a precedent for potential decisions taken elsewhere in the world for cultural properties impacted by acts of violence and destruction, this volume introduces academic researches, experiences and observations of heritage conservation theory and practice of heritage reconstruction. It also addresses the issue not merely from the point of a material conservation philosophy but within the context of holistic strategies for the protection of human rights and promotion of peace building.

This Open Access book explores heritage conservation ethics of post conflict and provides an important historical record of the possible reconstruction of the Bamiyan Buddha statues, which was inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage List in Danger in 2003 as "Cultural Landscape and Archaeological Remains of the Bamiyan Valley". With the condition that most surface of the original fragments of the Buddha statues were lost due to acts of deliberate destruction, this publication explores a reference point for conservation practitioners and policy makers around the world as they consider how to respond to on-going acts of destruction of cultural heritage. Whilst there has been an emerging debate to the ethics and nature of heritage reconstruction, this volume provides a plethora of ideas and approaches concerning the future treatment of the Bamiyan Buddha statues. It also addresses a number of fundamental questions on potential heritage reconstruction: how it will be done; who will decide; and what it should be done for. Moreover when it comes to the inscribed World Heritage properties, how can reconstructed heritage using non-original materials be considered to retain authenticity? With a view to serving as a precedent for potential decisions taken elsewhere in the world for cultural properties impacted by acts of violence and destruction, this volume introduces academic researches, experiences and observations of heritage conservation theory and practice of heritage reconstruction. It also addresses the issue not merely from the point of a material conservation philosophy but within the context of holistic strategies for the protection of human rights and promotion of peace building

Main description: For 1,400 years, two colossal figures of the Buddha overlooked the fertile Bamiyan Valley on the Silk Road in Afghanistan. Witness to a melting pot of passing monks, merchants, and armies, the Buddhas embodied the intersection of East and West, and their destruction by the Taliban in 2001 provoked international outrage. Llewelyn Morgan excavates the layers of meaning these vanished wonders hold for a fractured Afghanistan. Carved in the sixth and seventh centuries, the Buddhas represented a confluence of religious and artistic traditions from India, China, Central Asia, and Iran, and even an echo of Greek influence brought by Alexander the Great's armies. By the time Genghis Khan destroyed the town of Bamiyan six centuries later, Islam had replaced Buddhism as the local religion, and the Buddhas were celebrated as wonders of the Islamic world. Not until the nineteenth century did these figures come to the attention of Westerners. That is also the historical moment when the ground was laid for many of Afghanistan's current problems, including the rise of the Taliban and the oppression of the Hazara people of Bamiyan. In a strange twist, the Hazaras-descendants of the conquering Mongol hordes who stormed Bamiyan in the thirteenth century-had come to venerate the Buddhas that once dominated their valley as symbols of their very different religious identity. Incorporating the voices of the holy men, adventurers, and hostages throughout history who set eyes on the Bamiyan Buddhas, Morgan tells the history of this region of paradox and heartache.

This work reports on a real adventure in earth science and conservation, dealing with the UNESCO’s emergency activities implemented in Bamiyan (Central Afghanistan) for the recovery and rehabilitation of the cliff and niches after the destruction of the two famous Giant Statues in 2001. Since 2002 an international effort has been made to understand the geological characteristics of the area, the mechanical properties of local materials, petro-geophysical and sedimentological details as well as the historical and geological evolution of the Statues and cliff. Taken together, this information serves as a basis for the recovery and rehabilitation of the cliff and niches and is presented in detail.

In the contemporary world the meeting of Buddhism and Islam is most often imagined as one of violent confrontation. Indeed, the Taliban's destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas in 2001 seemed not only to reenact the infamous Muslim destruction of Nalanda monastery in the thirteenth century but also to reaffirm the stereotypes of Buddhism as a peaceful, rational philosophy and Islam as an inherently violent and irrational religion. But if Buddhist-Muslim history was simply repeated instances of Muslim militants attacking representations of the Buddha, how had the Bamiyan Buddha statues survived thirteen hundred years of Muslim rule? Buddhism and Islam on the Silk Road demonstrates that the history of Buddhist-Muslim interaction is much richer and more complex than many assume. This groundbreaking book covers Inner Asia from the eighth century through the Mongol empire and to the end of the Qing dynasty in the late nineteenth century. By exploring the meetings between Buddhists and Muslims along the Silk Road from Iran to China over more than a millennium, Johan Elverskog reveals that this long encounter was actually one of profound cross-cultural exchange in which two religious traditions were not only enriched but transformed in many ways.

This important catalogue presents the collection in its entirety, before the looting and destruction of war. It is an invaluable tool in the fight against illicit trafficking and the preservation of Afghanistan's cultural heritage. Situated at the crossroads of the world's oldest trade routes and populated by a mosaic of cultures, Afghanistan has been the theatre of repeated conflicts over its long and complex history. In the midst of the warfare and civil unrest that ravaged this ancient land during the last two decades of the twentieth century, hundreds of precious artefacts were plundered from the collections of the National Museum of Afghanistan in Kabul, which was founded in the early 1930s. The destruction of these irreplaceable treasures like the much-publicized Bamiyan Buddhas that were brutally destroyed in 2001 represents a tremendous loss not only for the people of Afghanistan but for all of humanity.With the aim of keeping alive the memory of the museum's scattered collections, specialist Francine Tissot has compiled a systematic listing of the holdings as they were conserved, in their intact state, in the museum's showcases and reserve collections until 1985. This comprehensive catalogue, is illustrated with over 1,600 photographs and drawings.

This work reports on a real adventure in earth science and conservation, dealing with the UNESCO’s emergency activities implemented in Bamiyan (Central Afghanistan) for the recovery and rehabilitation of the cliff and niches after the destruction of the two famous Giant Statues in 2001. Since 2002 an international effort has been made to understand the geological characteristics of the area, the mechanical properties of local materials, petro-geophysical and sedimentological details as well as the historical and geological evolution of the Statues and cliff. Taken together, this information serves as a basis for the recovery and rehabilitation of the cliff and niches and is presented in detail.