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Land & Ages

The LandRivers, doabs, Harappa and the first cities, seasons, numbersAgesEight ages of the Punjab, from the Soan to todayTimelineEvery dated event on one lineAtlasEvery place on one map, age by agePlacesCities, ancient sites, temples, mosques and gurdwaras, battlefieldsLanguage & scriptsPunjabi, its dialects, Gurmukhi and Shahmukhi

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Kingdoms & Struggles

Kingdoms & WarsWho ruled the Punjab, the Kingdom of Lahore, and the battles fought over itWho ruled the PunjabEvery ruling power, 518 BCE to todayWars & BattlesFrom the Hydaspes to BasantarStruggles & Partitions1849, 1919, 1947, 1966, 1984, 2020

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CulturePoets, qisse, songs, music, dance, festivals, foodMuseumSculpture, coins, manuscripts, painting, arms, buildings, and where to see themChronicles & ProphecyThe poetry of the old chroniclesAboutWhat this atlas is, its sources, and every word explainedHelp maintain this siteCorrections, pictures, sources and new entries
Punjab WikiPlacesCities & forts
Peshawar
franek2 · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia
City or fort

Peshawar

ਪਿਸ਼ਾਵਰپشاور

Gateway to the Khyber Pass. Brought under direct Sikh rule in 1834 with Hari Singh Nalwa as governor.

Peshawar, at the mouth of the Khyber Pass, has been the gateway of the subcontinent for more than two thousand years: Kanishka's capital, a Mughal city, the winter capital of the Durrani kings.

Ranjit Singh made it tributary in 1823 and annexed it in 1834. Hari Singh Nalwa governed it and built the fort of Jamrud; Avitabile ruled it with an iron hand. Guru Nanak is said to have visited Gorakh Hatri here.

A small Sikh community still lives in Peshawar and keeps Gurdwara Bhai Joga Singh. It is the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Peshawar, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan

People

Raj Kapoor
Raj Kapoor1924 – 1988

Actor and director born in Peshawar whose tramp in Awaara and Shree 420 was loved from Moscow to Cairo.

Prithviraj Kapoor
Prithviraj Kapoor1906 – 1972

Actor from Lyallpur and Peshawar who starred in India's first talkie, founded Prithvi Theatres and began the Kapoor dynasty of Bombay cinema.

Maharaja Ranjit Singh
Maharaja Ranjit Singh1780 – 1839

Sher-e-Punjab, the Lion of Punjab. United the misls into the Sikh Empire, ruled from Lahore for forty years and covered the Harmandir Sahib in gold.

Mahmud of Ghazni
Mahmud of Ghazni971 – 1030

Turkic sultan who raided India some seventeen times. His conquests made Lahore a Ghaznavid city and brought Punjab into the Persian-speaking Islamic world.

Hari Singh Nalwa
Hari Singh Nalwa1791 – 1837

Commander-in-chief of the Sikh army on the north-west frontier. Governed Kashmir and Peshawar and died holding Jamrud against the Afghans.

Kanishka
Kanishka2nd century CE

Greatest of the Kushan emperors, patron of Buddhism and Gandharan art, who built a huge stupa at Peshawar.

Kanwar Nau Nihal Singh
Kanwar Nau Nihal Singh1821 – 1840

Able grandson of Ranjit Singh who effectively ruled in his father's place. Returning from his father's cremation, he was struck by falling masonry from a Lahore gateway and died the same day.

Jayapala
Jayapaladied c. 1002

Hindu Shahi king of Punjab defeated by Mahmud of Ghazni near Peshawar in 1001. Shamed, he is said to have burned himself on a pyre.

Paolo Avitabile
Paolo Avitabile1791 – 1850

Neapolitan soldier who governed Wazirabad and then Peshawar for the Sikh Empire with notorious severity.

Jean-François Allard
Jean-François Allard1785 – 1839

Veteran of Napoleon's cavalry who arrived in Lahore in 1822 and raised the Fauj-i-Khas, the elite French-drilled brigade of the Sikh army.

Claude Auguste Court
Claude Auguste Court1793 – 1880

Saint-Cyr-trained French officer who cast and commanded Ranjit Singh's artillery and mapped and dug the antiquities of the Punjab.

Battles

1001PeshawarBattle of PeshawarMahmud of GhaznivsJayapala of the Hindu ShahisGhaznavid victory1834PeshawarAnnexation of PeshawarHari Singh Nalwa, Nau Nihal SinghvsBarakzai sardars of PeshawarPeshawar under direct Sikh rule

Artifacts

The Fasting Buddha
The Fasting Buddha2nd – 3rd century CE

The Buddha in the years of starvation before his enlightenment, every rib and vein showing: the most famous sculpture of Gandhara, found at Sikri near Mardan.

Ashoka's rock edicts at Shahbazgarhi
Ashoka's rock edicts at Shahbazgarhic. 250 BCE

The Mauryan emperor's edicts on great boulders in Gandhara, in the Kharoshthi script of the north-west: among the oldest writing in the Punjab after the Indus seals.

Gandharan Bodhisattvas
Gandharan Bodhisattvas2nd – 3rd century CE

Princely figures of the Buddha-to-be, with moustaches, turbans, jewels and sandals, modelled on the Kushan nobles of Gandhara.

Kanishka's gold coins
Kanishka's gold coinsc. 127 – 150 CE

Gold coins of the Kushan emperor that carry one of the earliest images of the Buddha, named BODDO in Greek letters.

The Bakhshali manuscript
The Bakhshali manuscript3rd – 10th century CE (dates disputed)

A mathematical text on seventy leaves of birch bark, dug up by a farmer at Bakhshali near Mardan in 1881. It uses a dot for zero, one of the oldest written zeros known.

Takht-i-Bahi monastery
Takht-i-Bahi monastery1st – 7th century CE

A Buddhist monastery on a ridge north of Mardan, the most complete in Gandhara, with its stupa court, monks' cells and assembly hall still standing.

The Kanishka casket
The Kanishka casketc. 2nd century CE

A gilded reliquary found in 1908–09 in the ruins of Kanishka's great stupa at Shah-ji-ki-Dheri outside Peshawar. On its lid the Buddha sits between the gods Brahma and Indra; on its side stands a Kushan king, probably Kanishka himself.

On the timeline

2nd century CE · Kanishka and Gandharan art9th century · The Hindu Shahis1001 · Mahmud of Ghazni defeats Jayapala1001 · Battle of Peshawar1834 · Peshawar under Sikh rule

In the world's museums

105 objects →
Pathan men from Peshawar, Pakistan in traditional dress: group portraitPathan men from Peshawar, Pakistan in traditional dress: group portrait1900 · PakistanWellcome Collection ↗Peshawar, India, 20.12.28Peshawar, India, 20.12.281928 · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗Photograph of an ancient Hindu wood carving from Kashmir Smast in Peshawar District…Photograph of an ancient Hindu wood carving from Kashmir Smast in Peshawar District…Peshawar Museum · photo Fowler&fowler at English Wikipedia (Wikimedia Commons) ↗Textile, PeshawarTextile, Peshawarc. 1890 · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗Peshawar Pottery, Albert Hall MuseumPeshawar Pottery, Albert Hall MuseumWikimedia Commons · Neek-Theri · CC BY-SA ↗Head, PeshawarHead, Peshawar1st century BC · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗Bronze Buddha image, from Gandhara, Sahr-i Bahlol, Peshawar Valley PakistanBronze Buddha image, from Gandhara, Sahr-i Bahlol, Peshawar Valley PakistanBritish Museum, London · photo Zunkir (Wikimedia Commons) · CC BY-SA ↗Head of Bodhisattva, 150-300 CE, near Peshawar, Gandhara, V&AHead of Bodhisattva, 150-300 CE, near Peshawar, Gandhara, V&AV&A, London · photo SpeakingArch (Wikimedia Commons) · CC BY-SA ↗View of houses adjoining a stream, PeshawarView of houses adjoining a stream, Peshawar05/1855 · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗Street scene in PeshawarStreet scene in Peshawar01/1855 · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗Bust, PeshawarBust, Peshawar1st century BC · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗Head, PeshawarHead, Peshawar1st century BC (?) · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗Figure, PeshawarFigure, Peshawar1st century BC · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗Head, PeshawarHead, Peshawar1st century BC · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗Figure, PeshawarFigure, Peshawar1st century BC · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗Figure, PeshawarFigure, Peshawar1st century BC · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗Bust, PeshawarBust, Peshawar1st century BC · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗Figure, PeshawarFigure, Peshawar1st century BC · Peshawar© Victoria and Albert Museum, London ↗

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