Bhaktapur

Bhaktapur is a city in the east of the Kathmandu Valley in Nepal, about 13 kilometres from the capital, Kathmandu. Its name means City of Devotees; it is known locally as Khwopa and was historically called Bhadgaon. It is the smallest municipality of Nepal by size and the most densely populated, and together with Kathmandu and Lalitpur it is one of the three main cities of the valley and a major Newar settlement. Chronicles such as the Gopal Raj Vamshavali put its foundation in the 12th century, and it served as the capital of Nepal during the first half of the Malla dynasty, until the kingdom split into three in 1482. Its position on the India-Tibet trade route made it wealthy, but after annexation by the Gorkha Kingdom in 1769 it became isolated, and the 1934 earthquake and the April 2015 earthquake both damaged it badly. The Nyatapola, a five-roofed pagoda completed in 1702, is its best known monument, and UNESCO inscribed the city as a World Heritage Site in 1979. The 2021 census counted 79,136 residents.