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Himalaya
Day 56: Kathmandu
We meet up in Patan, once one of three independent kingdoms in the Valley, and now almost a suburb of Kathmandu. The jewel at the heart of Patan (pronounced Parton, as in Dolly) is Durbar Square, a dazzling collection of buildings dating back 350 to 500 years, to the days before Prithvi Naryan Shah, king of Ghorka, unified the kingdoms of the Valley in 1768 and created modern Nepal. There are temples, palaces with golden gates, a huge bell suspended between two pillars and a lion on a column. Nepal was never colonized, so the architecture has no Western derivative and its distinctive fusion of Indian and Tibetan influences was created by the Newars, the people of the Valley, and craftsmen of the highest order.
Choose another day from Himalaya
PALIN'S GUIDES
- Series: Himalaya
- Chapter: Day 56: Kathmandu
- Country/sea: Nepal
- Place: Kathmandu
- Book page no: 125
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