The Grand Trunk Road is one of South Asia's oldest and longest major roads. For more than 2 millennium, it has linked the eastern and western regions of the Indian subcontinent, running from Chittagong, Bangladesh through to Howrah, West Bengal in India, across north India into Peshawar (in present day Pakistan), up to Kabul, Afghanistan. Its former names include UttaraPatha ("The Road to North"), Shah Rah-e-Azam ("Great Road") or Sadak-e-Azam or Badshahi Sadak.
The route spanning the GT road existed during the Mauryan Empire, extending from the mouth of the Ganges to the north-western frontier of the Empire. The modern road was rebuilt by Sher Shah Suri, who renovated and extended the ancient route in the 16th century.
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“At sundown, leaving the river road awhile for shortness, we went by way of Enfield, where we stopped for the night. This, like most of the localities bearing names on this road, was a place to name which, in the midst of the unnamed and unincorporated wilderness, was to make a distinction without a difference, it seemed to me.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)