Bamiyan Buddhas

News: Taliban change tune towards heritage sites, including pre-Islamic relics, in Afghanistan.

About Bamiyan Buddhas

• The Buddhas of Bamiyan were two monumental size statues, standing at 115 and 174 feet tall, carved into the sandstone cliffs of the Bamiyan valley in Hazarajat region of central Afghanistan.
  • The larger of the two statues, represented the Buddha Vairochana.
  • The smaller of the two statues, depicted the Buddha Shakyamuni.
• They were called Salsal and Shamama by locals.
  • Salsal means “the light shines through the universe”;
  • Shamama is “Queen Mother”.
• Period: They are said to date back to the 5^th-6^th century AD and were once the tallest standing Buddhas in the world.
• The site marks the original settlement of Bamiyan as stopping place on the branch of the Silk Route, which linked China and India via ancient Bactria.
• Cultural confluence: They were great examples of a confluence of the Gupta, Sassanian and Hellenistic artistic styles.
  • These statues best exemplified the Gandharan Buddhist art school.
• Destruction: In 2001, the Bamiyan statues were systematically destroyed by Taliban using explosives.
• In 2003, the Bamiyan Valley was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.