Pakistan Gandhara & Indus Valley Civilizations

Pakistan Gandhara & Indus Valley Civilizations

EMPIRE OF THE SPIRIT | PAKISTAN AND THE INDUS VALLEY CIVILIZATION

At 15,397 feet above sea level, the Khunjerab Pass is the highest paved international border crossing in the world, and our ancient, rattling public bus creaked and groaned up to it through spectacular mountain scenery, around hairpin bends with terrifying drops...

Welcome to part II of my Journey to the West, a six-week overland trip from Beijing, China, to Islamabad, Pakistan.

Click on photos to enlarge.

View of Hidden Peak (Gasherbrum I) near the Sino-Pakistani border at sunset | Karakoram Range | 8,080 m/26,510 ft

Physical Map of Pakistan (German version) | Click to enlarge

The Karakoram Highway to Pakistan | Tashkurgan Tajik Autonomous County, Xinjiang, China

Passing through the Tashkurgan Tajik Autonomous country on the notorious Karakoram Highway (KKH), I spent one night at this final Chinese outpost at 3,090 m/10,140 ft on my Journey to the West. According to the Chinese bus driver, the Pakistan border was an estimated 10 hour drive, depending on the changing conditions of the road.

Tashkurgan Tajik Autonomous County, Xinjiang, China

Tashkurgan | Tajik Man

Tashkurgan | Tajik Woman

Much of the Karakoram Highway was a narrow, rugged track, chiseled out of an unstable complex of different types of rock formed through violent seismic activity and extreme weather. I witnessed massive landslides, ice avalanches, and unpredictable flooding, and these events delayed the two-day crossing from Kashgar, China, several times.

Karakoram Highway | Kashgar, China, to Islamabad, Pakistan

From interpretation signage posted along the way, I learned that the Karakoram Highway was developed by Pakistani and Chinese engineers, and took 20 years and over 1,000 lives to construct, with particular hardship occurring in the remote areas of Pakistani‐controlled Kashmir.

Karakoram Highway Memorial

Indeed, things didn't always go as planned when travelling the Silk Road, a common theme in the journals of ancient Chinese monks, such as Xuan Zang, the who traveled this very route in the mid-seventh century.

Half way to the Pakistan border from Tashkurgan, the bus was forced to stop at a section of road that had been washed out from a flash flood during the night.

In the spirit of the monks and merchants of yesteryear who had experienced great challenges on the Silk Road, I felt it was a great opportunity to get off the bus and get my hands dirty. Fortunately, the road workers allowed me to help them construct the cages of rocks in wire needed to temporarily repair the road so we could pass.

Roadwork on the Karakoram Highway near the Sino-Pakistani border after an overnight flash flood

The Khunjerab Pass | Sino-Pakistani border

At 4,693 m/15,397 ft above sea level, the Khunjerab Pass is the highest paved international border crossing in the world, and our ancient, rattling public bus creaked and groaned up to it through spectacular mountain scenery, around hairpin bends with terrifying drops.

Khunjerab Pass, Sino-Pakistani border crossing | 4,693 m/15,397 ft

The Hunza Valley | Gilgit-Baltistan

The first evening in Pakistan, I arrived in the Hunza Valley with my new Pakistani guide, Iqbal, and driver, Usman (featured image at top of page). Waking up at first light and walking outside, I was stunned by the view of Rakaposhi, towering 7,788 m/25,551 ft above, surrounded by deep blue sky.

Rakaposhi | 27th highest mountain in the world | 7,788 m/25,551 ft

The Hunza is a high-mountain sanctuary fed by glacial streams and known for the longevity of its people. In the morning, I woke to views of snowcapped mountain peaks, melting glaciers, and fertile valleys with apple, apricot, and pear orchards. The headwaters of the fertile Hunza River, rich with minerals from the high glaciers, sparkled on the valley floor, it's waters flowing to join the Indus from Tibet.

Hunza Valley, Gilgit-Baltistan region, Pakistan | Averaging 2,500 m/8,200 ft

Landslides from sedimentary rock, shale, and glacial debris shaken lose from earthquakes characterize the landscape, and it is logical to assume this led to the name Karakoram, Turkish for black gravel, given by early Central Asian traders. Today, K for Karakoram, stands for the second highest mountain in the world, K-2.

My driver, Usman, said to me, with his eyes peeled to the road, “I use both eyes, one for the road, one for falling rocks.”  He suggested buckling my seat belt: “Muslims believe that life is very precious.”

A landslide blocks our travel south | Karakoram Highway | Pakistan

The junction point of three greatest mountain ranges of the world

Following the Gilgit River south, we reached a place that geographers dream about – the  junction point of the three highest mountain ranges in the world.

In the photo below, the ranges are as follows: Himalayas (right), the Karakoram (distant center), and the Hindu Kush (left).

This was also my first glimpse of the Indus River (right) as it emerges from the Tibetan Plateau. The Gilgit River is on the left.

Junction point of three greatest mountain ranges of the world | Himalayas (right), Karakoram (center), and Hindu Kush (left)

Taxila | Archaeological site visit

As described on my Silk Road page, the UNESCO-listed Taxila was one of the most ancient universities in the world, where people from all over Asia came to study medicine, religion, and science. Instruction was available in at least five different languages, and this multicultural environment contributed to the pre-eminence of Taxila as a center of learning by the 5th century BCE.

Taxila, Pakistan | Excavated remains of the ancient Greek city at Sirkap, founded by Bactrian King Demetrius in 190 BCE

At the height of the Maurya Empire in 250 BCE, King Ashoka recognized the significance of Taxila as an international city at the crossroads of Persia, India, and China, and declared it the provincial capital of his empire.

The Jaulian Monastery

The Jaulian Monastery is the treasure of Taxila, an ancient education and art center with preserved stupas depicting Greek, Indian and Chinese cultural images. The site was of special interest to archaeologist Sir John Marshall (discussed below).

A place of ancient pilgrimage, my local Muslim guide compared it to Mecca, "Many people in history made a great journey to reach this location."

Jaulian Monastery | Taxila Archaeological Site, Pakistan

Interview at Jaulian Monastery | Taxila

Stupas at Jaulian Monastery | Taxila

Sir John Marshall (1876-1958)

Any account of the research and excavations at Taxila, and the Indus Valley Civilization sites of Harappa and Mohenjodaro, would be incomplete without mentioning Sir John Marshall, the Director-General of the Archaeological Survey of India from 1902 to 1928. He was the first person in modern times to recognize the significance of these abandoned cities, and worked extensively to document, protect, and popularize these mysterious ancient sites.

During my site visit at Taxila, I had the opportunity to personally interview the grandson of Basharai Khan, who was Sir John Marshal's personal assistant. Alongside learning about Marshal's fieldwork, I was also fortunate to visit the Taxila museum, which he founded in 1918.

 

Portrait of Sir John Marshall (1876-1958) | Taxila Museum, Pakistan

The works of Sir John Marshall in PDF

John Marshall’s outstanding work is currently online and publicly available at: Archive.org.

Below, I have provided direct links to three relevant books from Sir John Marshall’s legacy.

  • Marshall, J. (ed.) (1931). Mohenjo-Daro and the Indus Civilization. | 30Mb
  • Marshall, J. (1951). Taxila: An illustrated account of archaeological excavations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. | 65Mb
  • Marshall, J. (1960). The Buddhist art of Gandhara: the story of the early school, its birth, growth and decline. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. | 65Mb

Gandhāra Civilization | Greco-Buddhist art

Taxila was a key site where the ancient Greeks met the Buddhists, a cultural coincidence that occurred at the dawn of Mahāyāna Buddhism and the development of the Gandhāran civilization. Gandhāra reached its zenith during the Kushan period in the 2nd century AD.

Fasting Buddha, Gandharan period, 2nd Century CE | Lahore Museum, Pakistan

Click on the links provided here to view my PDF presentations of Gandhara and Taxila, featuring site visits to the Second City of Sirkap, founded by Demetrius in 190 BCE, and the ruins of Jaulian, a two-thousand-year-old monetary which served as an education center.

Academic Resource Online | Gandhara Sculpture from Pakistan Museums

In 1960, a comprehensive exhibition of Gandharan sculpture was brought to America. Subsequently, sixty-five free-standing and relief sculptures dating from the 2nd -5th centuries A.D. were photographed, catalogued and published as Gandhara Sculpture from Pakistan Museums. The book visually represents the golden age of Gandhara, when the flourishing Buddhist colonies created some of the first representations of the Buddha in human form. Benjamin Rowland, Harvard University,1960

Sakyamuni's First Meeting with a Brahmin | Late 1st century, fine-grained schist, Peshawar Museum

The Indus River Valley Civilization | Harappa

Continuing to travel south from the Taxila archaeological sites, I began to understand what makes the Indus River Valley such a unique area of historical significance, and why the entire subcontinent is named after it. This valley was the cradle of many great Indian cultures, not only Hindu, Jain and Buddhist, but also older and more mysterious cultures whose scripts remain undeciphered.

The Pashupati Seal | Meditating Yogi with horned headdress surrounded by animals | Indus Valley Civilization | Moenjodaro

A day's drive south from Taxila and the capital city of Islamabad, I felt like a time-traveler, heading back thousands of years before the 2000-year-old Gandhara Civilization to experience first-hand the 5000-year-old Harappa archaeological site and the Indus Valley Civilization, an enigmatic slice of ancient history that has profoundly influenced the way people think throughout Asia and the world.

Harappa | Archaeological site visit

Beginning over five thousand years ago, the UNESCO-listed site of Harappa was once one of the world’s most important cities and cultural centers.

Through personal interview with my Pakistani guide, Shafik Malik, he told me a story of a young Sir John Marshall working on a British railroad project in the area:

"Villagers were bringing wheelbarrows loaded with red bricks for use as fill under the railroad tracks, and Marshall, suspecting that they looked unusual, asked where they came from. The villagers told him about a place where there were scores of old bricks spread out all over the land, and no one had idea where they were actually from. Marshall went to investigate..."

Since the discovery and excavation of the site in 1921 by Marshall, Harappa has come to be recognized as one of the oldest and most important civilizations and archaeological sites in the world.

Red bricks form foundations of ancient workshops at Harappa | Indus River Valley Civilization

UNESCO divides Harappa’s history into five key phases:

c. 3300-2800 BCE – Ravi
c. 2800-2600 BCE – Early Harappan
c. 2600-1900 BCE – Harappan
c. 1900-1800 BCE – Transitional
c. 1800-1300 BCE – Late Harappan

5,000-year-old red Harappan bricks | Indus Valley Civilization

Shafik Malik | Pakistani Guide | Harappa Archaeological Site | June 24, 2001

As explained by Mr. Malik and outlined in the interpretation signage at the site, the earliest settlement at Harappa was the Ravi phase, founded on an ancient levee of the river Ravi between 3500 and 3300 BCE.

With more than a decade of experience working at Harappa, I wanted to know more about Malik's personal feelings about the site:

“At 2600 BC the Harappa Civilization is magnificent, a great city center with monumental public buildings, craft areas, bazaars, and connecting trade routes to the world... Small manufactured seals still puzzle us with undeciphered inscriptions… When I think about Harappa, I get a mystic feeling.”

Ravi/Early Harappan Phase 3300-2600 BCE | Click to PDF slides

Archaeological work on the Ravi phase has revealed that these early inhabitants imported stone from what is now Afghanistan and western India, and shells from the Arabian Sea to make beads. They manufactured earthenware vessels and figurines of clay by hand.

Water well and sewage systems at the Harappa archaeological site

Red bricks of Harappa

Locals at Harappa

Pakistan Photo Journal | June 2001

The 15 photos shown below were taken during the drive south from the Sino-Pakistani border to Faisal Mosque in Islamabad.

Welcome to Pakistan | International border police

Karakoram Highway | People's Republic of China & Islamic Republic of Pakistan | 1958-1978

Entering Pakistan en route to the Hunza Valley | Karakoram Highway | Gilgit-Baltistan | View from the bus window

English-made Bedford truck decorated with Pakistani Islamic art

Usman | Pakistani driver and international guide

Pakistani youth | Hunza Valley

Hopper Glacier | Naga Valley | Gilgit-Baltistan

Hunza Valley stream | Gilgit-Baltistan

Upper Indus River Valley | Road of Alexander the Great still visible on the opposite bank above the river

Nanga Parabat | Killer Mountain | Third highest peak in the world

Gem stones for sale at Nanga Parabat

Upper Indus River Valley | Gilgit-Baltistan

4th-8th Century Buddhist rock carvings above the Indus River | Shatial (west of Chilas), upper Indus Valley | Sogdian Iranian Civilization

Crossing the Indus by single-cable chairlift | Shatial

Pakistani kids | A few hours north of Islamabad

Faisal Mosque | Islamabad

Mohenjo Daro 101 | National Geographic 3:14

Thank you for visiting my Pakistan Page.

If you feel motivated to know more about the Silk Road or other Learning Adventures, or would like to arrange for me to give a public talk, please let me know – I’d love to hear from you.

–Steven Martin