Pakistan’s tourism is expected to increase manifold due to the excavationsof new structures in the ancient city of Bazira that was conquered byAlexander the Great centuries ago.
Located in Barizot in Swat Valley, Bazira has been under excavations by theItalian Archaeological Mission to Pakistan since the 1970s. The RegionalDirector at the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Archaeology and Museums Directorate inSwat, Niaz Ali Shah, who works on the site with Italian archaeologistsbelieves that the “latest discovery will woo religious tourists to visittheir historical places”.
“As we’ve exposed the ancient history of other religions through materialremains, it will primarily attract Buddhist and Hindus’ tourists to visitthis town to see how we preserve their history,” he added.
Alexander the Great had laid siege to the city in 327 BCE, for which it hasearned the name ‘the city of Alexander’. Bazira was also part of severalancient empires since its conquest, including the Maurya Empire, theKushans, the Hindu Shahis, and the Ghaznavids.
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Archaeologists say this month’s excavations, which include unearthed walls,bastions, and the stairs of a fort on the Ghwandai hill at the foot ofwhich Bazira urban settlements were built, have increased theirunderstanding of the city’s structure.
Dr. Luca M. Olivieri, who leads the Italian mission said, “The mostimportant and recent discovery on the hill concerns three points, includingthe existence of a seventh-11th century Shahi-era fortress that defended awater reservoir for the temple and an earlier Kushan acropolis of whichimportant monumental traces remain”.
