Page:Asoka - the Buddhist Emperor of India.djvu/79

Rh Sîr on the Lidar river, not far from Islâmâbâd and Mârtânda and more than thirty miles distant from Srînagar. Legend credited Asoka with having built five hundred Buddhist monasteries in Kashmir, and it is certain that his zeal was responsible for many important ediﬁces, including some dedicated to the Brahmanical faith

The inclusion in the empire of the Nepalese Tarai, or lowlands, is proved conclusively by the inscriptions on the Rurnmindeî and Niglîva pillars which commemorate the pilgrimage of the sovereign to the Buddhist holy places in B. c. 249.

Genuine local tradition—not mere literary legend—confirmed by the existence of well-preserved monuments, attests Asokafs effective possession of the secluded valley of Nepal. The pilgrimage under the guidance of Upagupta, described in the last chapter, or another of the same kind, was continued, through either the Churiâ Ghâtî or the Gorainasan Pass, into the valley, the capital of which, then known by the name of Manju Péitan, occupied the same site as the modern city of Kâthmându. Asoka resolved to commemorate his visit by the foundation of a city and the emotion of massive monuments. The site selected for the new capital was some rising ground about two miles to the south-east of Kathmandu, and there the city now known as Lalita Piitan or Patan was laid out. Exactly in its centre Asoka erected a