Nazim ullah Baig's video: Peshawar Tour with Discovery Pakistan www discoverypakistan

https://discoverypakistan.com/ Peshawar was founded on the Gandhara Plains in the broad Valley of Peshawar. The city likely first existed as a small village in the 5th century BCE, within the cultural sphere of eastern ancient Persia.Peshawar was founded near the ancient Gandharan capital city of Pushkalavati, near present-day Charsadda. Greek In the winter of 327–26 BCE, Alexander the Great subdued the Valley of Peshawar during his invasion of ancient India, as well as the nearby Swat and Buner valleys. Following Alexander's conquest, the Valley of Peshawar came under suzerainty of Seleucus I Nicator, founder of the Seleucid Empire. A locally-made vase fragment that was found in Peshawar depicts a scene from Sophocles' play Antigone. Mauryan The nearby Takht-i-Bahi monastery was established in 46 CE, and was once a major centre of Buddhist learning. Following the Seleucid–Mauryan war, the region was ceded to the Mauryan Empire in 303 BCE. Around 300 BCE, the Greek diplomat and historian Megasthenes noted that Purushapura (ancient Peshawar) was the western terminus of a Mauryan road that connected the city to the empire's capital at Pataliputra, near the city of Patna in the modern-day Indian state of Bihar. As Mauryan power declined, the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom based in modern Afghanistan declared its independence from the Seleucid Empire, and quickly seized ancient Peshawar around 190 BCE.[39] The city was then ruled by several Iranic Parthian kingdoms. The city was then captured by Gondophares, founder of the Indo-Parthian Kingdom. Gondophares established the nearby Takht-i-Bahi monastery in 46 CE. Kushan Peshawar's Kanishka stupa once kept sacred Buddhist relics in the Kanishka casket. In the first century of the Common era, Purushapura came under control of Kujula Kadphises, founder of the Kushan Empire.The city was made the empire's winter capital.The Kushan's summer capital at Kapisi (modern Bagram, Afghanistan[citation needed]) was seen as the secondary capital of the empire,[43] while Puruṣapura was considered to be the empire's primary capital.[43] Ancient Peshawar's population was estimated to be 120,000, which would make it the seventh-most populous city in the world at the time.[44] Around 128 CE, ancient Peshawar was made sole capital of the Kushan Empire under the rule of Kanishka.As a devout Buddhist, the emperor built the grand Kanishka Mahavihara monastery. After his death the magnificent Kanishka stupa was built in Peshawar to house Buddhist relics. The golden age of the Kushan empire in Peshawar ended in 232 CE with the death of the last great Kushan king, Vasudeva I. Around 260 CE, the armies of the Sasanid Emperor Shapur I launched an attack against Peshawar,[46] and severely damage Buddhist monuments and monasteries throughout the Valley of Peshawar.[33] Shapur's campaign also resulted in damage to the city's monumental stupa and monastery.[ The Kushans were made subordinate to the Sasanids, and their power rapidly dwindled, as the Sasanids blocked lucrative trade routes westward out of the city. Kushan Emperor Kanishka III was able to temporarily reestablish control over the entire Valley of Peshawar after Shapur's invasion,[33] but the city was then captured by the Central Asian Kidarite kingdom in the early 400s CE. White Huns The White Huns devastated ancient Peshawar in the 460s CE, and ravaged the entire region of Gandhara, destroying its numerous monasteries. The Kanishka stupa was rebuilt during the White Hun era with the construction of a tall wooden superstructure, built atop a stone base, and crowned with a 13-layer copper-gilded chatra. In the 400s CE, the Chinese Buddhist pilgrim Faxian visited the structure and described it as "the highest of all the towers" in the "terrestrial world",which ancient travelers claimed was up to 560 feet (170 m) tall,[43] though modern estimates suggest a height of 400 feet (120 m). In 520 CE the Chinese monk Song Yun visited Gandhara and ancient Peshawar during the White Hun era, and noted that it was in conflict with nearby Kapisa. The Chinese monk and traveler Xuanzang visited ancient Peshawar around 630 CE,[53] after Kapisa victory, and expressed lament that the city and its great Buddhist monuments had decayed to ruin[54]—although some monks studying Hinayana Buddhism continued to study at the monastery's ruins.Xuanzang estimated that only about 1,000 families continued in a small quarter among the ruins of the former grand capital.