Shatial is a transit station with archaeological significance on

Karakoram Highway The Karakoram Highway ( ur, , translit=śāhirāh qarāquram; known by its initials KKH, also known as N-35 or National Highway 35 ( ur, ) or the China-Pakistan Friendship Highway) is a national highway which extends from Hasan Abdal in ...

Gilgit-Baltistan Gilgit-Baltistan (; ), formerly known as the Northern Areas, is a region administered by Pakistan as an administrative territory, and constituting the northern portion of the larger Kashmir region which has been the subject of a dispute bet ...

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...

Location

Shatial is an important transit station consisting mainly of shops, rest places, and sarais. It is located west of Chilas in the upper Indus Valley beside the Indus River in Gilgit-Baltistan. Historically it acted as a junction of old routes and byways connecting

Swat Valley Swat District (, ps, سوات ولسوالۍ, ) is a district in the Malakand Division of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. With a population of 2,309,570 per the 2017 national census, Swat is the 15th-largest district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa prov ...

Gilgit Gilgit (; Shina: ; ur, ) is the capital city of Gilgit–Baltistan, Pakistan. The city is located in a broad valley near the confluence of the Gilgit River and the Hunza River. It is a major tourist destination in Pakistan, serving as a h ...

, Chilas, and

Chitral Chitral ( khw, , lit=field, translit=ćhitrār; ur, , translit=ćitrāl) is situated on the Chitral River in northern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. It serves as the capital of the Chitral District and before that as the capital of Chitral ...

Archaeological sites

As a historical

crossroads Crossroads, crossroad, cross road or similar may refer to: * Crossroads (junction), where four roads meet Film and television Films * ''Crossroads'' (1928 film), a 1928 Japanese film by Teinosuke Kinugasa * ''Cross Roads'' (film), a 1930 Brit ...

, many traders, Buddhist missionaries, Sogdian merchants, and pilgrims passed through Shatial leaving behind graffiti and inscriptions on the rocks. More than 1000 inscriptions and 700

petroglyphs A petroglyph is an image created by removing part of a rock surface by incising, picking, carving, or abrading, as a form of rock art. Outside North America, scholars often use terms such as "carving", "engraving", or other descriptions ...

can be found at the Shatial bridge on the

Indus river The Indus ( ) is a transboundary river of Asia and a trans-Himalayan river of South and Central Asia. The river rises in mountain springs northeast of Mount Kailash in Western Tibet, flows northwest through the disputed region of Kashmir, ...

. Iranian merchants left behind over 550 inscriptions dating from third to seventh centuries in the

Sogdian language The Sogdian language was an Eastern Iranian languages, Eastern Iranian language spoken mainly in the Central Asian region of Sogdia (capital: Samarkand; other chief cities: Panjakent, Fergana, Khujand, and Bukhara), located in modern-day Uzbekist ...

, nine in the extinct

Bactrian language Bactrian (, , ) is an extinct Eastern Iranian language formerly spoken in the Central Asian region of Bactria (in present-day Afghanistan) and used as the official language of the Kushan, and the Hephthalite empires. Name It was long thought t ...

, and two in

Middle Persian Middle Persian or Pahlavi, also known by its endonym Pārsīk or Pārsīg () in its later form, is a Western Middle Iranian language which became the literary language of the Sasanian Empire. For some time after the Sasanian collapse, Middle Per ...

and

Parthian Parthian may be: Historical * A demonym "of Parthia", a region of north-eastern of Greater Iran * Parthian Empire (247 BC – 224 AD) * Parthian language, a now-extinct Middle Iranian language * Parthian shot, an archery skill famously employed by ...

each. Many of these inscriptions are short, consisting of just the names of the travelers, though in some cases names of two or more family members are also mentioned. Many inscriptions also mention a date, possibly of arrival, but it is unknown whether this refers to the date or year of journey. Nanaivandak, a famous merchant from

Samarkand fa, سمرقند , native_name_lang = , settlement_type = City , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from the top:Registan square, Shah-i-Zinda necropolis, Bibi-Khanym Mosque, view inside Shah-i-Zinda, ...

who is a subject in

Susan Whitfield Susan Whitfield (born 1960) is a British scholar, currently Professor in Silk Road Studies at the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures (SISJAC), University of East Anglia. She previously worked at the British Library in ...

's book ''Life Along the Silk Road'', wrote the longest such inscription reading: These Iranian inscriptions are significant in providing insight on the naming traditions of Sogdians of the time as some of these are

theophoric A theophoric name (from Greek language, Greek: , ''theophoros'', literally "bearing or carrying a god") embeds the word equivalent of 'god' or God's name in a person's name, reflecting something about the character of the person so named in relat ...

referring to

Zoroastrian Zoroastrianism is an Iranian religion and one of the world's oldest organized faiths, based on the teachings of the Iranian-speaking prophet Zoroaster. It has a dualistic cosmology of good and evil within the framework of a monotheistic on ...

and other deities. Though these inscriptions do not establish an exact date or period, it is believed that most of them belong to the

Sasanian The Sasanian () or Sassanid Empire, officially known as the Empire of Iranians (, ) and also referred to by historians as the Neo-Persian Empire, was the last Iranian empire before the early Muslim conquests of the 7th-8th centuries AD. Named ...

period (224–651 AD). Scripts and graffiti in ancient

Brahmi Brahmi (; ; ISO 15919, ISO: ''Brāhmī'') is a writing system of ancient South Asia. "Until the late nineteenth century, the script of the Aśokan (non-Kharosthi) inscriptions and its immediate derivatives was referred to by various names such ...

and

Kharosthi The Kharoṣṭhī script, also spelled Kharoshthi (Kharosthi: ), was an ancient Indo-Iranian script used by various Aryan peoples in north-western regions of the Indian subcontinent, more precisely around present-day northern Pakistan and ...

languages are found on the rocks revealing that the place also served as a Buddhist shrine. The Buddhist travelers venerated these inscriptions and artwork, particularly a large

triptych A triptych ( ; from the Greek language, Greek adjective ''τρίπτυχον'' "''triptukhon''" ("three-fold"), from ''tri'', i.e., "three" and ''ptysso'', i.e., "to fold" or ''ptyx'', i.e., "fold") is a work of art (usually a panel painting) t ...

with drawings of a

stupa A stupa ( sa, स्तूप, lit=heap, ) is a mound-like or hemispherical structure containing relics (such as ''śarīra'' – typically the remains of Buddhist monks or nuns) that is used as a place of meditation. In Buddhism, circumamb ...

and

Sibi Jataka Shibi Jataka is one of the Jataka tales detailing episodes of the various incarnations of Buddha. Each Jataka tale illustrates the Buddhist ideals of ''Dhamma'' and sacrifice in various forms. Tradition states that these tales were narrated by Buddh ...

Location

Archaeological sites

References

Further reading