Darul Aman Palace
Darul Aman Palace (Pashto: د دارالامان ماڼۍ; Dari: کاخ دارالامان, "Abode of Peace" or, in a double meaning, "Abode of Aman[ullah]") is a three-story neoclassical palace located in the Darulaman district, approximately eight kilometres southwest of central Kabul, Afghanistan. Built in the 1920s during the reign of King Amanullah Khan, it was intended as the centrepiece of a new administrative capital and the meeting place of Afghanistan's first parliament.[1][2]
Construction and design
Construction of the Darul Aman Palace began in the early 1920s as part of King Amanullah Khan's ambitious programme to modernise Afghanistan. In June 1926, Amanullah proclaimed himself King of Afghanistan (previously ruling as Emir since February 1919), and the palace was to anchor the new capital city called Darulaman, connected to Kabul by a narrow-gauge railway.[2][3]
Amanullah invited twenty-two architects from Germany and France to build the palace. The project was led by German engineer Walter Harten and his team, making the palace a testimony to the Afghan–German ties of the period. The French architects A. Godard and M. Godard also contributed to the design. The building was constructed from 1920 to 1929, with the main structure completed in 1927. It contained approximately 150 rooms, one library, and 32 toilets, with each floor comprising 5,400 square metres of space. The palace was thirty-three metres high.[2][3][4]
The palace was one of the first buildings in Afghanistan to receive central heating and running water. It was designed as a neoclassical structure on a hilltop overlooking a flat valley, with a large oval theater on the third floor intended to serve as the Majlis, the meeting place of Parliament. The first floor, overlooking the great road, was intended for the offices of the king, his private secretaries, and the ministries of the court.[3][4]
The king's reforms and downfall
King Amanullah's reign (1919–1929) was marked by sweeping modernisation reforms. He won Afghanistan's independence from Britain in 1919, promulgated the country's first constitution in 1923, invested in education through literacy programmes and the building of schools, and promoted social reforms including unveiling and the end of purdah.[3][5]
Amanullah returned from a tour of Europe and Turkey in 1928 inspired by Atatürk's reforms in Turkey: women unveiled, men in Western suits, co-education introduced. Conservative and tribal opposition hardened into armed rebellion under Habibullah Kalakani, who took Kabul in January 1929. Amanullah abdicated and fled to India, then Italy, where he died in exile in 1960.[4][5]
The palace was never properly finished. After Amanullah's downfall, Darul Aman ceased being the Afghan capital. The unfinished building served various purposes over the decades: Kabul University's medical school, a storage space for raisins, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Public Works, the Ministry of Justice and Supreme Court, the General Staff building, the Ministry of Defense, and a mujahideen base camp.[3]
Destruction and decay
The palace suffered a series of destructive events over the decades. It was first gutted by fire in 1969 during the reign of King Zahir Shah, reportedly from an electrical short circuit in the records room of the Ministry of Public Works. It was rebuilt and used to house the Ministry of Defense during the 1970s and 1980s.[4]
The palace was destroyed again during the 1978 Saur Revolution and the subsequent Soviet–Afghan War. During the civil war of 1992–1996, rival mujahideen factions fought for control of Kabul, and Darul Aman became both base camp and target. The building was shelled repeatedly and left as a roofless shell.[4][5]
After the Taliban fell in 2001, a U.S. bomb plummeted through all three floors and deep into the ground below, leaving a crater in the centre of the palace. Sandbag-reinforced lookouts, second-floor offices converted into improvised mosques, and debris from refugees who sheltered in the east wing marked the ruins.[3]
Restoration
Between 2014 and 2020, the Afghan Ministry of Public Works undertook a phased restoration of the palace, led by President Ashraf Ghani (a former World Bank official who had written about the palace as a "palace of abandoned dreams"). Most work was completed for the 100th anniversary of Afghan independence, which was celebrated on 19 August 2019. The palace was officially inaugurated on that occasion, with participation from members of the royal family, including two daughters of King Amanullah.[1][4]
The restoration returned the palace's columns, arches, and wings to something approaching their original grandeur. The site is now open to the public and tourists, and the surrounding area includes the National Assembly, the National Museum of Afghanistan, and the Afghan International University.[1]
Symbolism
For Afghans, the Darul Aman Palace has always symbolised the unfinished project of modernisation that Amanullah began — a project that has been returned to again and again by successive generations of Afghan reformers, each time collapsing under its own difficulties. The palace stands as both a monument to Afghan ambition and a cautionary tale about the limits of top-down reform.[3][5]