For many centuries Afghanistan was located on the old serais (along the Silk Road) between Europe and China and India. Many important cultural centres developed along the way. During and after the 15th Century Europe developed new sea routes to the east. The trade over land decreased and the cultural centres along the
Silk Road became more isolated. The ancient town of Kholm stood in the
Oxus plain, surrounded by productive orchards, but it was destroyed by
Ahmad Shah Durrani, who took all the inhabitants away from Kholm to populate the new town. The current town Kholm was founded nearby early in the 19th century and grew to become the most important town in northern Afghanistan. A large variety of industrial products and commodities were transported by camel caravans: weapons, knives, metal thread, needles, glass, mirrors, porcelain, paper, tea, cotton and silk cloth. Most of these products were produced in the European part of Russia, some originated from Russian Turkestan. From India many locally manufactured and British industrial products went the other way: binoculars, razor blades, indigo, spices, ivory, coconuts and brocades. Afghanistan contributed to this trade with wool, raw silk, fruits, vegetable dyes and horses. In the 2nd quarter of the 19th century it first belonged to the rather large independent
Kunduz state. Then in 1841 the capital of the Kunduz state shifted to Kholm. However, in 1845 most of the state seceded under the leadership of Kunduz. So, Kholm remained the capital of a small independent state. During the first decades of the 20th century Kholm gradually lost its position as the emporium of northern Afghanistan. Mazar-e Sharif and Kunduz, better positioned for crossing the Amu Darya river, took over and the caravan traffic stopped. Although Kholm had lost its importance as a centre for international trade, local craftsmen and refugees from Soviet Central Asia, (most of them being craftsmen as well) reinforced the position of Kholm as a centre for the production of a variety of objects for daily use throughout the country. In the 1960s the asphalted road between Kabul and Mazar-e Sharif was completed. The 350 kilometres between the two cities could now be covered in 8–9 hours (instead of the previous two weeks travel). The number of foreign and domestic tourists visiting Kholm increased considerably. Apart from larger numbers of individual visitors, organized tours started arriving. A large number of antique shops were opened for visitors. During the 1970s Kholm was declared a 'town of art-historical significance' by UNESCO, while the Tim, the centre of the ancient bazaar, was declared a national monument by the Afghan government. On June 11, 1987, an
Antonov An-26 (YA-BAL) of
Bakhtar Afghan Airlines was shot down near Khost on a passenger flight from
Kandahar to
Kabul, killing all 53 onboard. Rebels who shot down the flight had mistaken it for a military
Ilyushin 14. The crash was, at the time, Afghanistan's deadliest. On November 2, 2025, a magnitude 6.3 earthquake struck 22 km WSW of Khulm, near the city of Mazar-i-Sharif, killing at least 20 people. ==Jahan Nama Palace==