Skardu

Skardu (Urdu: اسکردو, Balti: སྐརདུ་་ from Tibetan (Balti): skar rdo སྐར་རྡོ་ — "star stone, meteorite") is a town and capital of Skardu District, in Gilgit, Gilgit-Baltistan. Skardu is in the 10 kilometres (6 miles) wide by 40 kilometres (25 miles) long Skardu Valley, at the confluence of the Indus and the Shigar River. Skardu is at an altitude of nearly 2,500 metres (8,202 feet). The town is surrounded by grey-brown coloured mountains, which hide the 8,000 metre peaks of the nearby Karakoram range.

History

The first mention of Skardu dates to the first half of the 16th century. Mirza Haidar (1499–1551) described in his in the forties of the 16th century wrote Tarikh-i-Rashidi Baltistan and called Askardu as one of the districts of this country. With the conquest of Kashmir in 1586 by the Mughal Emperor Akbar (1556–1605) were starting with Ali Sher Khan Anchan, the kings of Skardu mentioned as ruler of Little Tibet in the historiography of the Mughal Empire. These are, in particular, histories of Al-Badaoni, Abu'l Fazl, 'Abdu-l Hamid Lahori, Saqi Must'ad Khan and Inayat Khan.

Skardu (disambiguation)

Skardu may refer to

Places