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ReligionNewsBlog.com • Item 231 • Posted: Tuesday August 6, 2002  

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Archaeologists suspect another statue hides near site of 2 destroyed figures
The Baltimore Sun, Aug. 4, 2002
http://www.baltimoresun.com/

By Liz Sly
Special To The Sun
Originally published August 4, 2002

BAMIYAN, Afghanistan – When the Taliban blew up the two giant Buddhas of Bamiyan, people around the world gasped in outrage at the willful destruction of such a highly prized archaeological site.

But it appears the Taliban overlooked one giant Buddha.

Archeologists have long suspected that a third giant Buddha, a reclining Sleeping Buddha, is buried somewhere between the two destroyed Buddhas. Now, with the end of Taliban rule and the restoration of a measure of peace and stability across the country, the quest to find it is being revived.

This Buddha is believed to be far bigger than either of the two that were destroyed. No one knows precisely where it is, though some claim they have a good idea. It might not have survived intact after languishing for many centuries beneath the debris of rocks and clay that accumulated at the foot of the cliff into which the Buddhas were carved.
[...]

If another giant Buddha were to rise from the debris of the Taliban’s destruction, it would be powerfully symbolic, not only for Bamiyan but for Afghanistan as a whole as it struggles to emerge from five years of harsh Taliban rule. But the question of whether to look for it is mired in debate.

The assumption that there is another giant Buddha is based on the journal of a 7th-century Chinese pilgrim, Hsuan-tsang, who describes a Sleeping Buddha between the two upright Buddhas. He puts its length at approximately 900 feet, five times the size of the larger of the two destroyed Buddhas, which rose to a height of 180 feet, and suggests it is located slightly closer to the smaller one.

The destroyed Buddhas were constructed over 200 years, between the third and fifth centuries, and because it was common at the time to depict Buddha in a variety of positions, it is highly plausible that those who built the two Buddhas also constructed a third in the classic reclining position around the same time, archaeologists say. What isn’t known is whether the Buddha was carved into the cliff, like the two that were destroyed, or whether it was freestanding.

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