PAKISTAN'S HISTORY AND HISTORICAL BACKGROUND
.A Cradle of Ancient Civilization
Pakistan emerged as an independent country on August 14, 1947, but it has a story of over five thousand years. When British archaeologist Sir Mortimer Wheeler was commissioned in 1947 by the Government of Pakistan to give a historical account of the then country , he entitled his work Five Thousand Years of Pakistan. Indeed, the land of Pakistan has been a cradle of ancient civilization.
With well-developed cities, Indus Valley Civilization (ca 2500-1600 BC), the principle sites of which lay in Pakistan's present-day Sindh and Punjab provinces, was contemporary of the Nile, Mesopotamian and Yellow River civilization. Over two thousand year ago, Gandhara Buddhist Civilization also flourished in areas now part of northern Pakistan with Taxi-la as a seat of Buddhist culture and learning. With passage of time, local Hindu rulers were displaced by Muslim conquerors from Central Asia, who in the tenth, eleven, and twelfth centuries, entered northwestern India through the same passes in the mountains used earlier by the Indo-Aryans.
Pakistan's Islamic heritage thus goes back to more than a millennium, and combine traditions of central Asia and west Asia in its architecture, language, poetry and literature. During this period, Indian witnessed Muslim rule at successive intervals under different dynasties which left deep impact on the lifestyle of the people of the subcontinent. There may have been many reason for Muslim conquests but the major reason was the spread of Islam in this part of the world which now constitutes a major religion not only in South West Asia but also East Asia.
The cultural heritage of Pakistan is spared over the centuries, starting Pre-historic times of the present-day with the richness of its history, cultural traditions and heritage matched only by the diversity and beauty of Pakistan's landscape.
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