Place · Ghaznavid palace city · Afghanistan
Lashkari Bazar
Also known as Lashkari Bazar, Lashkarī Bāzār, Lashkar-i Bazar, Bust
The Ghaznavid winter capital on the Helmand, built by Mahmud of Ghazni and expanded by his successors through the eleventh century. The surviving ruins run three kilometres along the river and include a large audience hall whose walls carried royal portrait frescoes — rare physical evidence of court painting in the Islamic east before the Mongol invasion. The twelfth-century Ghurid conquest ended its use, and Genghis Khan's armies demolished what remained in 1221. The French Archaeological Delegation excavated it between 1949 and 1952 and uncovered the frescoes.
- Function
- Authority & administration
- Tradition
- Standard reference and local gazetteers; ASI, state archaeology and INTACH records where applicable.
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 31.583, 64.362
Connections (1)
- Adjacent ghaznavid capitalGhazni
Lashkari Bazar on the Helmand and Ghazni in the eastern mountains are the two great Ghaznavid capital complexes, built by Mahmud of Ghazni and his successors through the eleventh century. Ghazni was the summer capital, Lashkari Bazar the winter — the court moved annually between them. Both were destroyed by Genghis Khan's armies in 1221; what remains at Lashkari is the audience hall with its surviving royal portrait frescoes, which are the richest physical evidence we have of eleventh-century Afghan court painting.