Pushkalavati
Pushkalavati ("lotus city", Greek Caspaturos ) was an ancient city in today's Pakistan , in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa about 27 km from Peschawar . Their fields of ruins lie on the Swat River in the vicinity of Charsadda . It was one of the main places in the Gandhara region and was not replaced by Peshawar until the 2nd century AD, when Kanishka moved his capital there.
The city consisted of three settlement centers. Bala Hisar is one kilometer from the northern outskirts and is the oldest in the 6th century BC. Founded part. Built here Asoka a large stupa , which still Xuanzang around 630 n. Chr admired.. Excavations took place in 1902 and 1958, and a swath was drawn through the hill of ruins. What remains are two flat elevations that are littered with pot shards.
Another kilometer northeast across a tributary of the Swat is the ruins of what is now known as Shaikhan Dheri between fields . The place was built by Bactrian Greeks and had right-angled streets. Parthians , Saks and the Kushan ruled here . The city was an important mint. The main streets of both cities were 750 meters long. Excavations took place here in the 1960s, during which only small parts were exposed and nothing was conserved. In the 2nd century AD the river changed course and the city was flooded. It was rebuilt in a place known today as Rajar . Rajar has not been excavated and, like large areas around Charsadda, is covered by modern tombs. The ruins of Mir Ziarat and Shar-i-Napursan are also nearby .
To the west of the city towards the Kabul River are some high, unexcavated hills called Prang . The place is probably sacred, the dead are burned here.
literature
- Sir Mortimer Wheeler : Charsada. A metropolis of the north-west frontier. Being a report on the excavations of 1958 . London 1962
- RAE Coningham, I. Ali (Ed.): Charsadda: the British-Pakistani excavations at the Bala Hisar. BAR International Series 1709. Society for South Asian Studies (British Academy) Monograph 5, Archaeopress, Oxford 2007