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Gandhara civilisation in Pakistan
PAKISTAN is endowed with some of the rarest civilisations and cultures spanning over thousands of years. The much-famed Harappan Civilisation that flourished here in the Indus Valley roughly between mid-third and mid-second millennia BC is termed as unique and stands out among its contemporaneous cultures of the world. With its decay, the localised cultures continued to flourish while a new type of powerful culture called Gandhara developed in northeastern Pakistan about the middle of the 1st millennium BC to around 7th century AD, famous for its refined art and Buddhist architecture.
Gandhara is generally taken as the region comprising of most of the
areas of what now is the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa of Pakistan and eastern Afghanistan. In the past, the area beginning from the junction of the river Kabul and the river Indus, including Taxila, had also been known as 'Charene'. The first mention of Gandhara in the historical literature (in the Bisutun inscription of Darius) shows it as part of the Achaemenian Empire in the times of Cyrus the Great (558-28 BC). It had a major role as the channel of communication with Iran and Central Asia. Gandhara was invaded by Alexander the Great in thewinterof327BC.
In the early seventh century AD its mention is found in the account of the Chinese Pilgrim, Hsuan Tsang who visited the Buddhist sites in this
region. In the 5 centurv BC, Gandhara is mentioned by the Greek historian Herodotus as one of the wealthiest territories. He
further noted that it served as source in providing the forces for the Persian King Xerxes I in his battles against the Greeks. In fact Gandhara by then had become a melting pot of Persian and South Asian Vedic traditions, while its capital was at Taxila, which then was also a great seat of higher learning.
In the 3rd century BC the Mauryan king Asoka, a convert to Buddhism, was for a time governor of Gandhara. During his reign the region also converted to Buddhism and, according to some scholars, it could have been here that the Mahayana Buddhism (in contrast to the earlier Theravada Buddhism) began to emerge. The proof of the proclamation of Buddha's Law in Gandhara is amply clear from the edicts of Asoka on a rock boulder at Shahbazgarhi in the Mardan district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa of Pakistan. The gradual decline of the Mauryan Empire following the death of Asoka in 232 BC again opened the region to foreign aggression.
Gandhara under the Kushans' patronage developed as a centre
for Buddhism around 64 AD. Even long afterwards it continued to draw Buddhist pilgrims from all over the South Asian Subcontinent and also China. It is known for not only giving the region a powerful rule but also maintaining contacts with the Roman Empire of Augustus.
The most famous of all the Kushan rulers was Kanishka, who became a convert to Buddhism like Asoka before him. His zeal for the newly adopted religion is evident from the numerous monasteries and stupas, the tomblike structures containing the relics of the Buddha or of Buddhist saints, built by him throughout the length and breadth ofhisempire.
It was especially during the period of Kushan that a style of Buddhist art known as Gandharan developed in the region. It was also this period to which are attributed the best pieces of sculptural art. The architectural activities of Gandhara of this period occupy the same prominent position as its fascinating art. 'Blending Hellenistic and Indian influences, the style depicted Buddha in human form for the first time, often with features resembling the Greek god Apollo and a Persian solar disk, or halo'. Although the Buddha himself never visited Gandhara, the texts composed by Buddhist sages under the Kushans made the region a genuinely holy land of Buddhism.
The Huns swept over Gandhara and the Punjab in the third quarter of the fifth century, which led to the fall of the Buddhist Empire in this region. Thanks to the archaeologists' spade that these sites were retrieved from under the earth in the twentieth century as treasures of the past.