Talk:Balkh

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No professional archaeologist has ever been able to work at Balkh. - an IP-user in bg: (unknown to me) says that there was a French team in 1930s working in Balkh. May be we should reconsider this sentence. --Nk 16:26, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

My statement. Then this 1998 source is misinformed?: "The ruins of the walls of this city are a length of three and half km and width of almost three km. Pre-Islamic relics are abundant, but no work has been done on the archaeology of these treasures"[1].

Sir Aurel Stein might be the figure that's haunting the Bulgarian memory: "Stein's unending series of attempts, spread over forty-odd years of wanderings, to obtain permission to explore in Afghanistan, particularly at Balkh, the ancient Bactra, hoping to uncover the remains of the Greco-Buddhist civilization of Hellenistic Bactria. "My hope of reaching Bactria made me take to Oriental studies, brought me to England & India, gave me my dearest friends & chances of fruitful work, and for all this I must be deeply grateful to Fate" (letter of 1923, quoted by Walker, p. 248). I do not know what moral to draw from the fact that, in the last year of his life, he was finally invited by the government of Afghanistan, the "Promised Land" of his private letters, only to die a week after he arrived in Kabul, a month shy of his eighty-first birthday."Review of biographies of Stein

A single Googling "Archaeology Balkh" will turn up information without digging, like pottery shards at Balkh, apparently. --Wetman 17:55, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Frankly, I have no idea. I just wanted to know if I have to change it or not :). Thank you. --Nk 12:11, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] The temple was Buddhist then Zoroastrian, not the other way around (... right?)

The article had:

For a long time the city and country was the central seat of the Zoroastrian religion, the founder of which, Zoroaster, died within the walls, according to the Persian poet Firdousi. In a fire-temple of Balkh, later converted to a Buddhist temple and given the name of Nava Vihara (Navbahar) in Persian chronicles, the Kashmiri Brahmins called Pramukh kept the lamps burning.

From the Memoirs of Xuanzang, we learn that, at the time of his visit in the 7th century, there were in the city, or its vicinity, about a hundred Buddhist convents, with 3,000 devotees, and that there was a large number of stupas, and other religious monuments. The most remarkable was the Nau Behar, (avci Bihara or New Convent), which possessed a very costly statue of Buddha. A curious notice of this building is found in the Arabian geographer Ibn Hawqal, an Arabian traveler of the 10th century, who describes Balkh as built of clay, with ramparts and six gates, and extending half a parasang. He also mentions a castle and a mosque.

However, the same temple is described twice here. I understand that it was in fact a Buddhist temple that was converted to Zoroasrianism, and not the other way around (unless it was converted twice?). So I merged the two descriptions, and added references to the most interesting Barmakids, guardians of that temple. Or Monastery, whatever :P I leave this notice here, 'cause I'm not exactly sure of the Buddhist -> Zoroastrian transformation, any sources for it being the other way around? flammifer^talk 21:32, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

History of the temple - interesting :) flammifer^talk 21:41, 15 May 2006 (UTC)