Museum sights in North West Frontier Province
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Mardan Museum
The small Mardan Museum has exhibits on Gandhara and local ethnography.
reviewed
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Chakdara Museum
Chakdara Museum is at the village's main intersection. Exhibits include well-preserved Buddhist statuary, carved columns and lintels from an old Swat mosque, and an ethnographic section with embroidery and lots of jewellery. Sadly, the captions are rather dismal and it is a poor relation to the excellent Swat Museum in Saidu Sharif.
reviewed
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A
Chitral Museum Of Archaeology & Ethnology
The small new Chitral Museum Of Archaeology & Ethnology is poorly signed but located next to the polo ground. It has a few local ethnographic exhibits, but is a little disappointing and keeps irregular hours (you may have to find someone to open it for you). It compares poorly with the excellent Kalasha museum (Kal'as'a Dur) in Bumboret.
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Swat Museum
Partly funded by the Japanese, the excellent Swat Museum in Saidu Sharif should be on anyone's itinerary if they have an interest in Buddhist Swat. Gandharan-style statuettes and friezes depict the lives of the Buddha along with seals, tiny reliquaries and other treasures, mostly from Butkara No 1 and Udegram. In other rooms are pre-Buddhist artefacts, and an ethnographic gallery with traditional carved Swati furniture, jewellery and some wonderful embroideries.
reviewed
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B
Bala Hisar Fort
The imposing Bala Hisar Fort and its bleak ramparts still appear to monitor movement along the Grand Trunk Rd. Babur first built a fort here in 1526 after capturing Peshawar. It was a royal residence for the Afghan Durrani dynasty before being captured, trashed, and in 1834, rebuilt in mud by the Sikhs (replaced by brick by the British). It's now the headquarters of the Frontier Corps. Access inside is limited, but there's a small museum and great views over the city from the ramparts.
reviewed
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C
Peshawar Museum
Housed in a glorious Victorian Mughal-Gothic hall across the tracks from the Old City, the Peshawar Museum has the largest collection of Gandharan art in the world, ranging from statues and friezes depicting the Buddha's life to winged cupids and Herculean heroes. It's a dizzying stylebook of Graeco-Bactrian art, if often let down by poor labelling (also check out the Graeco-Bactrian coinage hidden upstairs).
There's a small Islamic collection with some delightful illustrated books, and an ethnographic section with wooden effigies taken from a Kalasha cemetery, including an ancestor figure riding a two-headed horse.
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