Content area
Full Text
Soraya Tarzi's biggest distinction and the impact she had during the time she and her husband, Amanullah Khan, ruled Afghanistan can be judged by the fact that she is the only woman mentioned in the list of rulers of Afghanistan. She was more than just a queen - she was the Minister of Education and actively worked to educate and liberate the women of Afghanistan. She was known just as much for her social activism as she was for her unconventional, and often risqué, style.
Born in Damascus, Syria, on November 24, 1 899, Soraya Tarzi was the daughter of a well-known and respected Afghan intellectual and poet, Sardâr Mahmud Beg Tarzi. They belonged to the Muhammadzai tribe - a sub tribe of the powerful Barakzai dynasty. As one of Afghanistan's great thinkers, Mahmud Beg Tarzi was known as the father of Afghan journalism.
His father, Ghulam Muhammad Tarzi, an Agfhan poet and head of the Muhammadzai royal house, was exiled in 1 881 by Emir Abdur Rahman Khan, then ruler of Afghanistan at the time. Ghulam Muhammad Tarzi and his family moved to Turkey.
In 1901 Emir Abdur Rahman Khan's son, Emir Habibullah Khan, succeeded him and invited the Tarzi family back to Afghanistan. It was when the Tarzis were received at Habibullah' s court at the royal palace in Kabul that Soraya met the man she was going to marry: Habibullah' s son, Amanullah Khan.
Historians describe Amanullah and Soraya's relationship...