page_title: Skardu
section_title: Early history
hierarchical_section_title: Skardu / History / Early history
caption_attribution_description: English: Manthal Rock (Buddhist inscriptions) This is a photo of a monument in Pakistan identified as the GB-23
context_page_description: Skardu is a city in Gilgit-Baltistan region of Pakistan, and serves as the capital of Skardu District. Skardu is located in the 10 kilometres wide by 40 kilometres long Skardu Valley, at the confluence of the Indus and Shigar Rivers at an elevation of nearly 2,500 metres. The city is an important gateway to the eight-thousanders of the nearby Karakoram Mountain range. The town is located on the Indus river, which separates the Karakoram Range from the Himalayas.
context_section_description: The Skardu region was part of the cultural sphere of Buddhist Tibet since the founding of the Tibetan Empire under Songsten Gampo in the mid 7th-century CE. Tibetan tantric scriptures were found all over Baltistan until about the 9th century. Given the region's close proximity to Central Asia, Skardu remained in contact with tribes near Kashgar, in what is now China's westernmost province of Xinjiang.
  Following the dissolution of Tibetan suzerainty over Baltistan around the 9th-10th century CE,  Baltistan came under control of the local Maqpon Dynasty, a dynasty of Turkic extraction, which according to local tradition, is said to have been founded after a migrant from Kashmir named Ibrahim Shah married a local princess.
caption: The Manthal Buddha Rock dates from the era when the region's population was Buddhist.
exif: {"Image Make": "NIKON CORPORATION", "Image Model": "NIKON D5300", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Ver.1.00", "Image DateTime": "2015:09:04 10:23:02", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "228", "GPS GPSVersionID": "[2, 3, 0, 0]", "Image GPSInfo": "15264", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "300", "Thumbnail YResolution": "300", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "15860", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "9225", "Thumbnail YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/400", "EXIF FNumber": "10", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Unidentified", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "200", "EXIF SensitivityType": "Recommended Exposure Index", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0230", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2015:09:04 10:23:02", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2015:09:04 10:23:02", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "4", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "39/10", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "26", "EXIF SubSecTime": "70", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "70", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "70", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "6000", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "4000", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "15232", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CVAPattern": "[2, 0, 2, 0, 0, 1, 1, 2]", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "39", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "None", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0"}