Taxila Institute of Asian Civilizations

Abstract

Pharwala fort is located in the territory of Islamabad, on the left bank of Soan River about 35 kilometers from Islamabad. Pharwala fort was built by Kaigohar founder of the Gakharr dynasty. Pharwala fort is a glimpse of military architecture from medieval period. This fort is built on strategic point as the rulers were to defend the attacks from their enemy Sher Shah Suri who was Afghan warrior and built Rohtas fort at Jhelam. It is said that Kaigohar used to wear a plume or feathers in his headgear, in Persion ‘Par’ is used for plume and wearer of plume is ‘wala’ so both together are Parwala. (Hassan 2005). Baber used Parhala for this fort in Tuzk-i-Baberi. There is no wonder if we are taking about the historical architecture as a heritage in Pakistan because research in the field of architecture is already conducted in the various countries in context of conservation and preservation of historic place. Significance and value of the Pharwala fort as historical architecture need to asses and analysis with special reference of the historic archive and intellectual contribution. In this paper I am going to discuss the significance of Pharwala fort in presence of the historic and cultural context of architecture. Moreover intervention and contribution of the concerning stakeholders, specially authorities and intellectual, to retrieve and assign the historical significance will be analyses and evaluated