A Japanese team has found ancient murals in a cave near Afghanistan's giant Buddha statues which were destroyed by the Taliban, showing that Buddhism may have spread farther than previously thought, a researcher said yesterday.
One mural retains a vivid red and gold color, according to the Japanese team, which believes the stone walls likely once featured many Buddhist icons. Such caves have been found earlier in Afghanistan's central Bamiyan region but it was the first time they were discovered west of the once towering Buddha statues, which the Taliban blew up in 2001.
"We believe the murals were drawn after the giant Buddhas were built. This shows Buddhism was also propagated throughout the west side of the valley," Shunpei Ishii, a researcher at Japan's National Research Institute for Cultural Properties, said.
The world-famous statues were built at least 1,500 years ago when Bamiyan in the Hindu Kush mountains was a spiritual and commercial hub on the Silk Route.
The Japanese mission is part of a UNESCO effort to preserve what is left of Bamiyan. The newly discovered cave is 6km from the former Buddha statues and the murals were likely drawn in the 7th or 8th century AD, Ishii said.
Ishii's seven-member team found one mural with a strikingly colorful outline of a Buddhist figure.
"Most of the color in the cave had been fading or changing hue but we saw some red and green that were fairly bright. We also found a thin foil of gold cut into the wall," Ishii said.
The Taliban used tanks and dynamite in March 2001 to destroy the Buddha statues, enforcing an edict against idolatry under its austere interpretation of Islam despite international outrage.
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