Taxila: Ancient City of Learning and Trade in Gandhara

Taxila, known in Sanskrit as Takshashila, was one of the great cities of ancient South Asia, standing in the region of Gandhara in what is now northern Pakistan. From about the 6th century BC to the 5th century AD it was ruled in turn by Persians, Indian dynasties, Greeks, Scythians, Parthians and Kushans, and it became famous as a centre of learning and trade. Its ruins, spread across three successive city sites and dozens of Buddhist monuments, are a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

A crossroads city

Taxila lay on the main route between the plains of northern India and the passes leading to Afghanistan and Central Asia. Caravans carrying goods between the Ganges valley, Bactria and Persia passed through it, and it later sat on branches of the routes now called the Silk Road. Fertile land and good water in the valley of the Haro river helped support a large population.

The site was first identified in modern times by the British archaeologist Alexander Cunningham in the 1860s. The main excavations were led by Sir John Marshall of the Archaeological Survey of India between 1913 and 1934, and his reports remain the basic account of the city.

The three cities

Archaeologists distinguish three main urban sites. The oldest is the Bhir Mound, where a city with irregular streets and houses of rough stone grew up by about the 6th century BC. An earlier settlement on the Hathial ridge nearby goes back further still.

In the 2nd century BC the Indo-Greek kings built a new city at Sirkap. It had a fortified wall and a regular grid of streets around a main avenue, in the Greek manner, and was rebuilt under later Scythian and Parthian rulers. Among its buildings is the so-called Double-Headed Eagle Stupa, decorated with a mix of Greek and Indian motifs.

The third city, Sirsukh, was founded under the Kushans, probably in the late 1st or 2nd century AD. Only parts of its massive walls have been excavated. Around these cities stood Buddhist sites such as the Dharmarajika Stupa, traditionally linked to Ashoka, and the monasteries of Jaulian and Mohra Moradu, as well as the temple of Jandial with its Greek-style Ionic columns.

Under Persians, Mauryas and Greeks

In the late 6th century BC Gandhara became a province of the Persian Achaemenid Empire. It appears among the lands of Darius I in his inscriptions, and Taxila probably served as a regional centre, absorbing Persian influences such as the Aramaic script.

In 326 BC Alexander the Great reached Taxila. Its king, known to the Greeks as Taxiles and in Indian sources as Ambhi, submitted to him and provided troops for the campaign against Porus at the Hydaspes. Greek writers described Taxila as large and prosperous.

Soon afterwards the region came under Chandragupta Maurya. Buddhist tradition says that his grandson Ashoka served as governor at Taxila and was sent there to put down a revolt. An inscription in Aramaic found at Sirkap is usually attributed to Ashoka’s reign. After the Maurya Empire weakened, Indo-Greek rulers from Bactria took the region in the early 2nd century BC. An inscription on a pillar at Vidisha, set up around 110 BC by Heliodorus, describes him as a Greek envoy from Taxila sent by king Antialcidas.

Scythians, Parthians and Kushans

In the 1st century BC Indo-Scythian (Saka) rulers such as Maues took control, followed in the 1st century AD by the Indo-Parthian king Gondophares. Christian tradition, recorded in the apocryphal Acts of Thomas, links Gondophares with the apostle Thomas, though the story cannot be confirmed.

From the later 1st century AD Taxila became part of the Kushan Empire, whose rulers, including Kanishka, were great patrons of Buddhism. This was the peak of Gandharan art, which blended Greek, Roman, Persian and Indian styles in stone and stucco sculptures of the Buddha.

Life in the city

The excavations give a detailed picture of everyday life, especially at Sirkap. Houses were built of rubble stone around open courtyards, with shops facing the main street. Excavators found hoards of gold and silver jewellery, household pottery, iron tools, seals and toilet trays carved with scenes from Greek myth, showing the taste of well-off townspeople for imported styles.

Coins are among the most useful finds. Taxila produced some of the earliest coins in South Asia, including punch-marked silver pieces and locally cast copper coins. Later layers contain bilingual coins of the Indo-Greek kings, with Greek on one side and Prakrit in the Kharoshthi script on the other, followed by the issues of Scythian, Parthian and Kushan rulers. Because many of these coins can be roughly dated, they help archaeologists place buildings and layers in sequence.

Religious life was equally mixed. Alongside Buddhist stupas and monasteries, the ruins include the Jandial temple, which some scholars think may have served a Zoroastrian or other Iranian cult, as well as smaller shrines inside Sirkap whose exact use is still debated. Inscriptions in Kharoshthi record donations by local families and officials, giving names that otherwise would be lost.

A centre of learning

Buddhist Jataka tales and other texts describe young men from distant cities travelling to Takkasila to study the Vedas, archery, medicine and other arts with well-known teachers. The Pali texts say that Jivaka, physician to King Bimbisara of Magadha, trained there. Later tradition connects the political thinker Chanakya, adviser to Chandragupta Maurya, with Taxila, and the grammarian Panini came from the nearby region.

Taxila is often called the world’s oldest university, but this is misleading. The evidence points to independent teachers taking pupils in their homes, not to a single institution. Organised monastic universities on a large scale developed later, at places such as Nalanda.

Decline and rediscovery

Taxila prospered under the Kushans but declined afterwards. The Chinese pilgrim Faxian passed through Gandhara around 400 AD. In the 5th century the Hephthalites, often called the White Huns, overran the region, and Taxila is usually thought to have been sacked at that time. When Xuanzang visited around 630, he found the city largely ruined and many monasteries deserted.

The site was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1980. Today the Taxila Museum displays coins, jewellery, pottery and Gandharan sculpture from the excavations, while conservation of the exposed ruins remains an ongoing challenge.

By the numbers

Timeline

• c. 6th century BC: A city grows up at the Bhir Mound.
• Late 6th century BC: Gandhara becomes part of the Achaemenid Persian Empire.
• 326 BC: Ambhi of Taxila submits to Alexander the Great.
• c. 3rd century BC: Taxila is a provincial capital of the Maurya Empire.
• 2nd century BC: Indo-Greek rulers found the grid-planned city of Sirkap.
• 1st century AD: Indo-Parthian and then Kushan rule; Sirsukh is founded.
• 5th century AD: The Hephthalites overrun Gandhara and Taxila declines.
• c. 630: Xuanzang finds the city largely in ruins.
• 1913–1934: Sir John Marshall excavates the site.
• 1980: Taxila is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Why it matters

Taxila shows how one city could stand at the meeting point of Persian, Indian, Greek and Central Asian worlds for a thousand years. Its layered ruins record changing rulers, coinage, town planning and art, and its reputation for learning made it a symbol of ancient scholarship in South Asia.