Peshawar’s Gor Khatri (also pronounced as Gur-khattree) has almost always been an archaeologically and historically important site, from its Gandharan establishment to two millennia later.

The British Library holds from the Babarnama an illustration by Kesu Khurd depicting the Mughal emperor visiting a Hindu temple there. The Walters Art Museum holds a similar (unattributed) illustration from Babar’s memoirs. In his visit on March 26, 1519 AD, he notes that it was a holy place where devotees would have their heads shaved, with several rest houses around it.

Gor Khatri would then re-appear in the Mughal imagination a few generations later, when Jehanara Begum (1614-1681), Shah Jehan’s daughter, was determined to further Mughal imperial legacy. While her architectural prowess was already evident with the establishment of Chandni Chowk in Shahjahanabad (Old Delhi), Jehanara commissioned projects west of the Mughal capital as well. In Peshawar at the site of Gor Khatri, she built a caravanserai, which is mostly how the site has been preserved till today.

A British watercolour painting of an Italian residence in Peshawar reminds us of the city’s Sikh legacy and how one site has seen multiple transformations

A British watercolour painting of an Italian residence in Peshawar reminds us of the city’s Sikh legacy and how one site has seen multiple transformations

Despite Peshawar being wrested out of Mughal hands by the Durranis, it is during the Sikh rule of Peshawar 200 years later when Gor Khatri sees a recorded transformation.

AN ITALIAN IN PESHAWAR

French Emperor Napolean’s Grande Armée consisted of several mercenaries, including Poles, Italians and Mamluks from Egypt. Paolo Crescenzo Martino Avitabile was one such officer, an Italian from the Amalfi coast, who found himself out of a job after the end of the Napoleonic Wars. After a stint in Persia under Fath-Ali Shah Qajar, he came to the court of Maharaja Ranjit Singh in 1827.

Later serving as Governor of Peshawar from 1837-1843, Avitabile constructed a three-storeyed mansion on the site of Gor Khatri as his residence and from where to conduct his affairs. The Italian had taken over from Hari Singh Nalwa, Ranjit Singh’s most powerful and accomplished general, who had been killed in the Battle of Jamrud (1837).

Legends of Avitabile’s reign over Peshawar are filled with terror. Also known as Abu Tabela, British sources claim that Avitabile held public hangings, with the bodies on display for days. Despite the death of Ranjit Singh in 1839 and the subsequent disintegration of his Sikh empire, Avitabile kept control of Peshawar for four more years, later leaving for Agerola, along with his fees from the Sikh court.

LE MAISON DE L’AVITABILE

Lt James Rattray of the Second Grenadiers, Bengal Army, is mainly known for a folio titled Costumes and Scenery of Afghaunistan, first published in 1848, comprising 29 sketches of life in Afghanistan around the first Anglo-Afghan War (1838-1842). These were some of the first studies of Afghan and Pakhtun groups that those in England saw of the region the British were desperately trying to occupy.

Le[sic] Maison a Peshawur de Monsieur le General Avitabile [The House in Peshawar of General Avitabile] by Rattray is barely 10 by 14 inches, yet is a fascinating insight into how Hindu, Mughal, Sikh and Italian influences were noted by a British colonial officer.

Various scenes in the complex are depicted, as is a Hindu temple on the left, and the ramparts of the caravanserai. The large banyan tree that the Babarnama mentions as “its great tree”, and also shows prominently in its illustrations, is sadly not the subject of Rattray’s attention. He follows a documentary-style of painting, and in its foreground depicts Sikh soldiers, Muslims and a Hindu ascetic.

The house itself shows soldiers on a balcony, and various paintings that show hunting scenes and winged-creatures (potentially angels) blowing trumpets.

Nearly another two centuries later, a British officer’s impression of an Italian general’s residence came in the hands of a British auction house, owned by the French. Rattray’s depiction of Avitabile’s mansion was on sale at Christie’s in 2020, fetching a price of £11,875 (Rs 4.5 million).

It is now, rightfully, in Sikh hands. Prominent art collector Davinder Toor added it to his collection and organised its first major public display in the critically acclaimed exhibition ‘Ranjit Singh: Sikh, Warrior, King’ at London’s The Wallace Collection in the summer of 2024. Spearheaded by Toor, the display charted the power and influence of the Sikh Maharaja. Avitabile’s Gor Khatri, was his mark on Peshawar.

The writer is the Managing Editor at Folio Books. He can be reached at saeedhusain72@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, EOS, March 19th, 2026

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