The Buddhas of Bamiyan were two monumental statues of a standing Buddha that dated from the 6th century, and they were carved into a cliff, located in the Bamiyan Valley, within the Hindu Kush mountain range, in the central highlands of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan.
The Buddhas of Bamiyan were very impressive statues, and there was one smaller statue, which was built in 507, and another bigger statue, built in 554. As they are located in the Bamiyan Valley, after which they got their name, it opens out into a large basin bordered to the north by a long, high stretch of rocky cliffs, thus creating a surreal landscape that cannot be seen anywhere else.
Up until 2001, they were the prime example of standing Buddha carvings in the world that were admired for their majestic appearance in the Bamiyan Valley. They were the most famous cultural landmarks of the region, which UNESCO listed as a World Heritage Site in 2003, along with the surrounding cultural landscape and archaeological remains of the Bamiyan Valley.
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Unfortunately, in 2001, both of the Buddha statues were dynamited and destroyed by the Taliban regime because the then Taliban government declared that they were idols, and confronted the Islamic religion. They would appear as Gods to people, and they should not exist anymore. There were also some reports that the Buddhas of Bamiyan were destroyed because the people who lived in the area were suffering from famine, and the statues were receiving more money for their preservation and maintenance, rather than giving aid to the poor people.
Having in mind how difficult it is to convince the far-right Islamic “leaders” of how precious the history and the statues were to the world, unfortunately, the Buddhas of Bamiyan, being part of an extreme place that follows strict Sharia law, did not stand a chance. It is most likely that this act has been done in order to carry out the Islamic religious iconoclasm, in other words, to remove idols and paintings, and push the people to follow the one and only leader.
Today, all that is left for us to admire are the historic photos that are left from the Buddhas, during times when they were enjoying people gazing upon them, and as there are some plans for them to be rebuilt sometime in the future, they have to wait for different times when religion will not play that important role in Afghanistan, and we would be able to gaze upon the majestic statues of Buddhas in the amazing Bamiyan Valley.
