Archive - Our Forgotten History

My great-grandmother, the uncrowned queen of the valley.

They called her Ana. From a village in Ghorband, she raised rebels, future leaders, and a generation unafraid to confront Afghanistan’s warlords.

Jul 29 •

June 2025

The strange history of Afghanistan's poppy flower

The poppy is not just a flower. It is a lens through which we see how Afghanistan was shaped, exploited, and continually redefined. It tells the story…

Jun 25 •

Talkhan: the energy bar that defeated the Soviet Union

How a homemade Tajik energy bar made from walnuts and mulberries became the unlikely fuel behind Afghanistan’s resistance to Soviet occupation.

Jun 6 •

May 2025

Samangan: the city of Rostam and Sohrab

You’ve probably never heard of this city in Afghanistan — but it shaped one of Persia’s greatest literary tragedies.

May 27 •

Caravanserais: The Original Motorway Service Stations.

Before lattes and fuel pumps, there were caravanserais — and it was in the lands that now form much of Afghanistan that the idea first took shape.

May 15 •

Persian Gulf or Arabian Gulf?

As Trump revives the debate over the Gulf’s name and plans to rename the waters, history offers a clear record on why it has been known as the Persian…

May 8 •

How a polymath from Balkh invented the modern perfume

The liquid perfumes we use today — and which Europe claims as its own — began in the laboratories of medieval Persia, created by a genius who came from…

May 1 •

April 2025

Seven generations ago, my ancestors left Samarkand. I went back to find them

With no name, no grave, only a family tree drawn on paper — I set out to find the places my forefathers once called home.

Apr 25 •

Afghan women’s pain is powerful enough to fill theatres—but not airwaves

Reflections on the British theatre debut of Khaled Hosseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns, and the silence beyond the stage.

Apr 18 •

The Mughal empire began in Kabul

The V&A’s Great Mughals exhibition celebrates the empire’s golden age in India — but it all began with a refugee prince named Babur in Kabul.

Apr 14 •

The letter-writer of Ghorband

How an illiterate man taught himself to read using the Persian classics by Rumi, Saadi, Hafez and Ferdowsi —and made history run in my blood.

Apr 8 •

Kandahar: the second home of Zoroastrianism

They call it the heartland of the Taliban. But for over 3000 years it has been Zoroastrian, Buddhist, and Greek — long before the Kalashnikov was…

Apr 1 •

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