Herat

Herat, capital of the most westerly of the three divisions of Afghanistan, stands on the Hari-Rud, at the height of 2500 feet above the sea, in 34° 50’ N. lat., 62° 30’ E. long.; distance from Kabul, 390 miles west. Situated near the boundaries at once of Afghanistan, Persia, and the Transcaspian district of Russian Turkestan, Herat is one of the principal marts of Central Asia, carrying on at the same time extensive manufactures of its own in wool and leather. The vicinity, naturally fertile, has been artificially rendered much more so by means of irrigation, drawn from the Hari-Rud and its tributaries. Owing to this abundance in water, Herat and its district has been at all times famous for its rich crops and excellent fruits, in fact it has been the granary of the north-western portion of Afghanistan and of the adjoining Turkoman country. But the city claims notice mainly on political and military grounds. Long the royal seat of the descendants of Timur, and often a bone of contention between the warlike tribes all round, it is fortified by a ditch and wall, and is commanded on its north side by a strong citadel built under the direction of British officers, amongst whom the late Sir Eldred Pottinger occupied a pre-eminent place. In 1885–86 the fortifications of Herat were examined and armed by the military members of the Afghan Boundary Commission. In modern times the place has acquired a kind of European importance, being, towards Persia and Russia, the key of Afghanistan, which country in turn affords the only approach by land to western India. In this connection Herat has been viewed as an outpost of England’s eastern empire against Russian intrigue and encroachment. Hence it has been alike the subject of treaties and the occasion of wars between Great Britain, as the mistress of India, and Persia, as virtually a vassal of Russia. This feature of the history of the city was more specially developed in connection with the last conflict between Persia and England. In November 1856 the Shah, regarded by the British government as a vassal and agent of the Czar, captured Herat, while actually conducting negotiations for an amicable adjustment at Constantinople; but he was within a few months constrained to relinquish his prey and renounce his claims by a British expedition directed against the opposite extremity of his empire. Since Russia, after subduing the Tekke Turkomans and after having annexed the oasis of Merv (1884), pushed her frontiers as far as Chihl Dukhteran and Kosh Assiah, which is from 30 to 40 miles distant from the gates of Herat, the political importance of the place has grown immensely, and Herat is actually the pivot of the whole Central Asian question. From a commercial point of view Herat has been at all times an emporium for the trade between Central Asia, Persia, and India, as the caravan roads leading from the Oxus and from the Indus towards Persia and Western Asia had found here their point of junction. Indigo, dried fruits, dyes, asafœtida, rice, wool, carpets, raw hides, silk, and leather wares are the chief items of export, whilst chintzes, cloth, sugar, ironwares, and European arms are imported from the West, and quite recently to a large extent from Russia. In 1890 it was in contemplation to bring Herat into railway connection either through a branch-line coming from the Transcaspian railway from Dushak via Sarakhs in the north, or via Kandahar from the south, in which case Herat will again acquire its ancient importance from a commercial point of view. The town, famous in the time of Sultan Husein Baikara for its splendid buildings, is to-day a heap of ruins, out of which the citadel, the Charsu, the Timna Musjid, and parts of the Musallah are prominent as remnants of a bygone glory. The population, consisting chiefly of Persians, Tajiks, and Chihar Aimaks—Afghans constitute only the garrison—has fluctuated within the century from 100,000 to 10,000; the average pop. now being about 30,000. See Malleson’s Herat (1880); Yate’s Northern Afghanistan (1888).