Episode Information

In 1739 Persian Emperor Nadir attacked Delhi and returned to Persia loaded with treasure. When he was assassinated, a young general named Ahmad Shah Durrani took the Kohinoor diamond off Nadir’s corpse and escaped back to Afghanistan. Now, we follow writer and explorer Tahir Shah in his quest is for the legendary treasure, allegedly hidden in one of the many Buddhist cave complexes in the country. Shah relies on a collection of notes from his grandfather, whose search was interrupted by the outbreak of WWII. He investigates the famous Timurid minarets of Heart and visits the oldest mosaic tile workshop in the world, as well as travelling with a legendary Hoopoe bird in a cage and provoking people in teahouses to tell him stories. Finally Shah comes up with a hypothesis that the treasure should be hidden in the Bamyan valley, where the Taliban blew up the great Buddha statues in 2001...