What was Gandhara?
Gandhara was a great kingdom straddling present-day Pakistan and Afghanistan, and a vibrant crossroads of Indian, Iranian and Central Asian cultures. At the peak of its influence, from about 100 BC to AD 200, it was perhaps the world’s most important centre of Buddhism, and was almost certainly the gateway through which Buddhism was transmitted from India to China and elsewhere, to become one of the world’s great religions.
