Historic Urban Landscape of Bhaktapur, Kathmandu Valley

Ref.: 284
Área temática: 02 Integridad funcional de los paisajes urbanos históricos
Fecha de recepción: 30/11/2008

AUTORES (* Autor principal)

VON DER HEIDE, Susanne * (Alemania) - Himal Asia Foundation

ABSTRACT

The former royal city of Bhaktapur is part of the seven UNESCO World Heritage sites of the Kathmandu Valley. In contrast to the other two royal cities Kathmandu and Patan the urban cultural landscape of Bhaktapur still exhibits a reminiscence of one of the last remaining living cultures of Asia's past.
Bhaktapur, the `ancient city of culture', is renowned for its elegant art mainly from the Malla period, the colourful festivals and traditional age-old ritual dances. Down through centuries the country has been well known for its rich artistic creativity of the Newar society that has created this environment.

It is particularly the combination of its natural environment with outstanding historical and cultural sites and the traditional lifestyle of the Newari people that makes Bhaktapur unique. Therefore it should be considered to transform Bhaktapur and part of its surrounding area into an urban cultural landscape within the World Heritage List.

Eventhough not being far located from the cities of Kathmandu and Patan, where the way of living has considerably changed, the Newari, that are mostly farmers, traders and artists in Bhaktapur, are still carrying out a different way of living than in these other World Heritage listed cities.

The World Heritage listing has generated much-needed national and international recognition of and financial support for the cultural heritage sites of the Kathmandu Valley, which depend on it in particular for the maintenance not only of the monuments, but also for the preservation of the cultural environment and spiritual beliefs of the people, especially the Newar population. Therefore these latter need to be involved from the national level down in preserving and managing their traditional living areas.

With the transformation of Bhaktapur into an urban cultural landscape the possibilities to support this community and their efforts would increase, which in the long run would help the Newar society to preserve in particular those values and traditions with religious, spiritual, artistic or historic attributes, as they are threatened to fall into oblivion in the wake of globalisation

All this can only be achieved by education and the further training of local multiplicators. It is essential, for securing a durable, sustainable protection of cultural sites, to also ensure the transfer of practical knowledge from the research, training and service sectors and, furthermore, to have the best facilities available for documentation.

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