Taxila or Takshasila, as it was previously known, was a prosperous city in ancient India and a part of the Greater Gandhara region. The wealth of the city resulted from its position at the important meeting point of three historic trade routes; one from Eastern India or the “Royal Highway” as described by the Greek writer Megasthenes; second from Kashmir and Central Asia; and third from Western Asia. Taxila was a center of Buddhism, a hub of learning and an urban metropolis developed from a mix of cultures; the Achaemenids, Greeks, Mauryans, Sythins Parthians, Kushans, Huns and eventually the Muslims.
The evolution of the Taxila city shows different stages in the development of a city along the Indus, a city that encountered Persian, Greek and Central Asian cultures from the 5th century BCE to the 2nd century CE. The Achaemenian rule in Taxila lasted from the 6th Century BCE to 327 BCE, when Alexander the Great invaded the region. Within a decade of his death, Taxila was under the Mauryan Dynasty as Chandragupta Maurya conquered the region in 321 BCE. After his grandson, the great ruler Ashoka, converted to Buddhism in 262 BCE, Taxila became a great religious center. However, the Mauryan Dynasty soon declined after Ashoka’s death. For the next four hundred years, the city remained under Bactrian Greeks, Sakas, Parthians, and Kushans, respectively. The fall of the Kushan rule saw a series of short-lived dynasties taking control over the region. In the early 5th century CE, the city of Taxila was sacked, burnt, and destroyed by the White Huns, putting an end to most economic, religious and social activity.
Taxila was rediscovered in the late 19th century under the British rule of the subcontinent by Sir Alexander Cunningham, as he travelled throughout India following ancient pilgrimage routes of Chinese monks. It was not until the 20th century (between 1913 and 1934), that Taxila was extensively surveyed and excavated by the British archaeologist, Sir John Marshall (1876-1958).
The modern archaeological region of Taxila comprises 18 sites of significant cultural value which were inducted as a whole under the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1980. These sites include three main townships and many smaller remains, scattered in a radius of about 10 Km around the city. The earliest site is Bhir Mound, built on a Stone Age settlement as revealed by excavations. The second, is a Greek capital city called Sirkap, and the third is a Kushan settlement called Sirsukh.