Age of the Nandas and Mauryas c11.s30.1

c11.s30.1

The Tibetan historian Tāranāth mentions a tradition that Aśoka reduced a rising of the Nepālas and Khāśyas, tribes of Himalayan mountaineers, during his father's reign¹. Aśoka's pilgrimage to the birth-place of the Buddha and his inscribed pillars at Rummindei and Nigāli Sāgar attest the inclusion of the Nepalese Tarāi in the empire. Nepalese tradition further affirms that the pilgrimage of Aśoka under the guidance of Upagupta was continued into Nepal where he founded the city of Patan (two miles S. E. of Khatmandu) and built five *chaityas*, one at the centre of the new city and the rest at the cardinal points on its perimeter; the latter subsist to this day and conform in shape to the Sāñchī and Gandhāra types. Many stūpas marked the route of Aśoka from and to Pāṭaliputra. The king is said to have been accompanied by his daughter Cārumatī for whom a husband was found among the Kshatriyas of Nepal, by name Devapāla. Both Cārumatī and Devapāla resolved to spend their days in Nepal, and the city of Deopatan, one of the oldest cities of Nepal, is said to have been founded by him. In her old age Cārumatī built a *vihāra* named after her (now Chabahil) to the north of Deopatan, and she lived there a recluse till her death. The celebrated shrine of Svayambhunāth in Western Nepal, consecrated to the primordial Buddha, is also connected by tradition with the memory of the great emperor Aśoka.