Hindu and Buddhist Architectural Heritage of Pakistan - Vedic Period

The time period in the history of India known as the Vedic period or Vedic age is the period of the composition of the sacred texts called Vedas and other such texts in Vedic Sanskrit. The associated culture sometimes referred to as Vedic civilization was centred on the Punjab (modern day Pakistan and India) and the Gangetic plain (modern India). Scholarship places the Vedic period into the 2nd and 1st millennia BCE, continuing up to the 6th century BCE when it began to be transformed into classical forms of Hinduism. Early medieval Hindu authors suggest dates as early as the 4th millennium BCE.

Its early phase saw the formation of various kingdoms of ancient India. In its late phase (from c. 700 BCE), it saw the rise of the Mahajanapadas, and was succeeded by the golden age of Hinduism and classical Sanskrit literature, the Maurya Empire (from c. 320 BCE) and the Middle kingdoms of India.

Gandhāra (Sanskrit गन्धार, Persian Gandara, Waihind) (Urdu: گندھارا) is the name of an ancient Mahajanapada, in northern Pakistan (the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and parts of northern Punjab and Kashmir) and eastern Afghanistan. Gandhara was located mainly in the vale of Peshawar, the Potohar plateau (see Taxila) and on the northern side of the Kabul River. Its main cities were Peshawar and Taxila.

The Kingdom of Gandhara lasted from the 6th century BCE to the 11th century CE. It attained its height from the 1st century to the 5th century under the Buddhist Kushan Emperors. After it was conquered by Mahmud of Ghazni in 1021, the name Gandhara disappeared. During the Muslim period the area was administered from Lahore or from Kabul. During Mughal time the area was part of Kabul province.