Taxila

Taxila is a Tehsil in the Rawalpindi District of Punjab province of Pakistan. It is an important archaeological site.

Taxila is situated about 32 km (20 mi) northwest of Islamabad Capital Territory and Rawalpindi in Panjab; just off the Grand Trunk Road. Taxila lies 549 metres (1,801 ft) above sea level.
The city dates back to the Gandhara period and contains the ruins of the Gandhāran city of Takṣaśilā which was an important Hindu and Buddhist centre. Takṣaśilā, is reputed to derive its name from Takṣa, who was the great grandson of Bharata, the brother of Rama.
Historically, Takṣaśilā lay at the crossroads of three major trade routes:
The uttarāpatha, the northern road—the later Grand Trunk or GT Road—the royal road which connected Gandhara in the west to the kingdom of Magadha and its capital Pāṭaliputra in the valley of the Ganges in the east.
The northwestern route through Bactria, Kāpiśa, and Puṣkalāvatī.
The Sindu (English: Indus river) route from Kashmir and Central Asia, via Śri nagara, Mansehra, and the Haripur valley[2] across the Khunjerab pass to the Silk Road in the north to the Indian Ocean in the south. The Khunjerab passes between Kashmir and Xinjiang—the current Karakoram highway—and was traversed in antiquity.

In 1980, Taxila was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site with multiple locations.[3] Recently it has been ranked as the top tourist destination in Pakistan by The Guardian,[4] which described it thus:“ This is the region from where Buddhism travelled to the far east - and Persians, Greeks and Hindus all subsequently left their mark. You can watch the sun set from the remains of a Buddhist monastery or wander through the streets of an excavatedPersian city in the knowledge that there are two older ones buried below."