2016-07-05 Tue

Large layers of a 2nd century Indo-Greek city with weapons, coins and pottery forms imported from Greek Bactria and from the Mediterranean area were discovered by archaeologists at Bazira, Barikot.

As per officials, apart from the Indo-Greek city, many artefacts found at the site reveal a lot about the pre-Greek city, the 3rd BCE Mauryan settlement. Outside the Indo-Greek defensive wall, a proto-historic 7th-8th century BCE village Gandhara Grave Culture was also discovered.

A large late-Kushan Temple with four pillars was unearthed with flavours of Buddhist architecture unlike the contemporary stupa-cum-viharas layouts. They are in fact similar to Central Asian coeval examples.

All the pre-Greek layers were artificially destroyed along the Defensive wall for fortification. This proves the existence of a 7th BCE Iron Age village.

Officials have stated that Barikot is the only Indo-Greek city excavated at such a huge scale with an otherwise rare to find Kushan urban settlement. It will also become one of the largest and long-lasting excavation projects in Pakistan.