- Turquoise Mountain
Firuzkuh (The Turquoise Mountain) is the lost Afghan capital of the Middle Ages. It was reputedly one of the greatest cities of its age, but was destroyed by
Ögedei Khan , son ofGenghis Khan , in the early 1220s and lost to history. It has been proposed that the magnificentMinaret of Jam , inShahrak District ,Ghor Province , is the only standing remains of the city.New Discoveries
With the Allied invasion of
Afghanistan in2001 , the Taliban's hold on ancient places was broken, leaving the Ghor Province open to pillagers. Therefore, after the invasion, hundreds of diggers flocked to the Minaret to uncover lost gold. And uncover they did. There remains very little of the present city when visited byRory Stewart in 2002 (as much of it has been dug through), and many of the treasures that were in the city have now been sold in markets inHerat ,Kabul andTeheran .External links
* [http://www.turquoisemountain.org Turquoise Mountain Foundation]
References
* Stewart, Rory. 2006.
The Places In Between . Harvest Books. ISBN 0156031566.
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
