Wednesday, July 17, 2019

Kirtipur



Approximately 5 km southwest of Kathmandu city lies a small city known as Kirtipur. Kirti means glory and pur means city, hence this city can also be said City of Glory. This city is one of the main center of Newari culture, one of the ancient ethnic group. The ancient culture, tradition has still been preserved till this date.
Kirtipur is also well known for its religious sites. This place has various Hindu temples and Buddhist monastery. Bagh Bhairab one of the most popular temple lies at Kirtipur. It is dedicated to the lord Bhairab in the appearance of angry tiger. Local people worship this temple as the guardian of Kirtipur city. Uma Maheswar temple is another popular temple of Kirtipur. It lies on the hill top of Kirtipur from where the beautiful view of Kathmandu can be seen with the best panoramic view of Mountain ranges.

Chilancho Stupa is the next big attraction of Kirtipur. It is one of the oldest stupa of Kirtipur till this date. According to the inscription found in this Stupa it was built around 7 century in Licchavi Dinasty.
The history of Kirtipur is also very much interesting. Before 18th century Nepal was divided in various kingdoms and Kirtipur was part of Lalitpur. King Prithvi Narayan Shah from Gorkha who unified all the small kingdoms in one single Nepal started his unifying campaign where he also conquered Kirtipur in 1767 AD. But conquering Kirtipur became very hard for Prithvi Narayan Shah. He was able to get victory against Kirtipur only at his third attempt. In this war he lost his lots of brave warriors including Commander Kalu Pandey. Due to this Kirtipur is very well known for their bravery.
Beside this, there are various sites worth exploring like Chovar, Taudaha, Shri Kirti Monastery, Tribhuwan University and many more. This is one of the amaizing place in Kathmandu which no one should miss visiting.