Begram

The ancient city of Begram was partially excavated in the 1930s and 1940s by French archaeologists who uncovered a building with several rooms. Two of them—Rooms 10 and 13—had been sealed off in antiquity and contained a remarkable cache of works of art. Many had originated in distant lands: bronzes from the Greco-Roman world; glassware and porphyry from Roman Egypt; lacquered bowls from China; and ivory furniture ornaments either made in India or locally carved. The hoard dates to the rule of the Kushan Dynasty (1st–3rd centuries ad), a royal line descended from nomads in Bactria who conquered territory south of the Hindu Kush mountains and extended their empire to the Ganges River Valley in India.

Scholars have puzzled over the nature of the settlement at Begram ever since its discovery. Some believed it to be a city founded in the fourth century bc by Alexander the Great or his successors (Alexandria ad Caucasum) that later became the summer capital of the Kushan Dynasty. According to this view, the objects from Rooms 10 and 13 in Begram formed a royal treasury, hoarded or assembled over time by Kushan kings for their personal use. More recent studies have regarded Begram not as a royal city, but as an important trading center on the northwestern edge of the Kushan empire. In this view, the finds represent a splendid repository of trade goods, sealed off to protect valuable commodities awaiting further distribution along the Silk Road.