dreams melted into air, 1919–29streams and panoramic views of snow-capped mountains made Paghman
an idyllic place. Despite the destruction of the 1980s and ’90s, Paghman is
still a favourite summer retreat for Kabulis.
The new capital, known as Dar al-’Aman, designed as a capital for
a modern, independent state, was even more grandiose and cost the
equivalent of a whole year’s revenue. 33 The project was never completed,
partly because the plans covered a vast area of southwestern Kabul from
Pul-i Malan to Deh Mazang and Mir Wais Mina as far south as Rishkhor,
Chahardeh and the palace at Chehel Situn. 34 The new city bore the Amir’s
own name, but the title equally translated as House (or Door) of Peace, a
term that referred to emotive Islamic terminology, such as Dar al-’Amn,
House of Safety, and Dar al-Islam. Dar al-’Aman was spatially and ideo-
logically a rejection of the past, an ideological vision that was reinforced
at the entrance to the Taj Beg palace complex by the construction of the
Minar-i ‘Ilm wa Jahal, the Tower of Knowledge and Ignorance.
Dar al-’Aman wholeheartedly embraced European, in particu-
lar French, architectural models. The original plans were drawn up by
André Godard, Director of the newly established French Archaeological
Mission, who had trained as an architect. The heart of the new capital was
a straight, tree-lined boulevard that stretched for 7 kilometres (4 mi.),
which Byron declared to be ‘one of the most beautiful avenues in the
world’. Like Paris’s Champs-Élysées, the avenue ended at the Taj Beg palace
Paghman, Amir ’Aman Allah Khan’s monument to the fallen of the Third Afghan War
(foreground) and the Taq-i Zafar commemorating Afghanistan’s independence. Both
monuments were badly damaged during the Soviet occupation and in the subsequent
in-fighting between various mujahidin militias.