Author: Sayed Salahuddin
Publication: Reuters
Date: September 8, 2008
URL: http://in.reuters.com/article/lifestyleMolt/idINISL34253320080908?sp=true
Archaeologists have discovered a 19-metre
(62-foot) Buddha statue along with scores of other historical relics in central
Afghanistan near the ruins of giant statues destroyed by the Islamist Taliban
seven years ago.
The team was searching for a giant sleeping
Buddha believed to have been seen by a Chinese pilgrim centuries ago when
it came upon the relics in the central province of Bamiyan, an official said
on Monday.
"In total, 89 relics such as coins, ceramics
and a 19 meters statue have been unearthed," Mohammad Zia Afshar, adviser
in the information and culture ministry, told Reuters.
He said the idol, in sleeping posture, was
badly damaged. The other relics dated back to the Bacterian era and from Islamic
and Buddhist civilizations.
Lying on the old Silk Road and linking West
with the East, Bamiyan was once a thriving Buddhist centre where monks lived
in caves. In 2001 the Taliban blew up two giant standing Buddha statues carved
into a cliff face saying they were offensive to Islam, despite appeals worldwide.
Later that year U.S.-led and Afghan forces
toppled the Taliban government, and work has begun to restore the biggest
of the two destroyed statues, once the tallest standing Buddha in the world.
The mammoth task is expected to take a decade.
The latest discovery has raised hopes of finding
a 300-metre-long Buddha statue that according to an ancient Chinese pilgrim
is lying in Bamiyan, Afshar said.
Afghanistan has suffered decades of foreign
interventions and civil war, and many of its historical relics, belonging
to various civilizations, have been destroyed or looted.
Scientists said in April that they had found
conclusive evidence the world's first ever oil paintings were in caves near
the two destroyed giant statues of Buddha in Bamiyan, hundreds of years before
oil paint was used in Europe.
Samples from paintings dated to the 7th century
AD, they said. Paintings found in 12 of the 50 caves were created using oil
paints, possibly from walnut or poppy, according to the European Synchrotron
Radiation Facility (ESRF).
It was not until the 13th century that oil
was added to paints in Europe and oil paint was not widely used in Europe
till the early 15th century.
(Editing by Sanjeev Miglani and Jerry Norton)
