Gotihawa

{{Infobox settlement

|name = Gotihawa

|other_name =

|native_name = गोटिहवा

|nickname =

|settlement_type = Village development committee

|motto =

|image_skyline = Ashoka_Pillar_in_Lumbini_Nepal.jpg

|image_caption = The Gotihawa Pillar of Ashoka.

|image_flag =

|image_seal =

|image_map =

|mapsize = 300px

|map_caption = Map of the village development committees in Kapilvastu District

|pushpin_map = Nepal#South Asia

|pushpin_relief = yes

|pushpin_label_position = bottom

|pushpin_mapsize = 300

|pushpin_map_caption = Location in Nepal

|subdivision_type = Country

|subdivision_name = {{flag|Nepal}}

|subdivision_type1 = Zone

|subdivision_name1 = Lumbini Zone

|subdivision_type2 = District

|subdivision_name2 = Kapilvastu District

|

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|population_as_of = 1991

|population_footnotes =

|population_note =

|population_total = 3335

|population_density_km2 = auto

|population_blank1_title = Ethnicities

|timezone = Nepal Time

|utc_offset = +5:45

|timezone_DST =

|utc_offset_DST =

|coordinates = {{coord|27.51|83.03|type:adm2nd_region:NP_source:unmaps-enwiki|display=inline,title}}

|elevation_footnotes =

|elevation_m = 103

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}}

Gotihawa (formerly called Gutivā in Western sources) is a village development committee located about {{convert|4|km|abbr=out}} southeast of Kapilavastu, in Kapilvastu District, in the Lumbini Zone of southern Nepal. At the time of the 1991 Nepal census it had a population of 3,335 people living in 567 individual households.{{Cite web|url=http://www.digitalhimalaya.com/collections/nepalcensus/form.php?selection=1 |title=Nepal Census 2001 |work=Nepal's Village Development Committees |publisher=Digital Himalaya |access-date=14 December 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081012163506/http://www.digitalhimalaya.com/collections/nepalcensus/form.php?selection=1 |archive-date=12 October 2008 }}

History

Modern-day Gotihawa was known as Khemavati in ancient times. According to Theravāda Buddhist tradition, Kakusandha Buddha was born in Khemavati.{{cite book|last=Vicittasarabivamsa|first=U|author-link=Mingun Sayadaw|editor-last=Ko Lay|editor-first=U|editor2-last=Tin Lwin|editor2-first=U|title=The great chronicle of Buddhas, Volume One, Part Two|edition=1st|chapter=Chapter 22: Kakusandha Buddhavamsa|pages=274–80|publisher=Ti=Ni Publishing Center|location=Yangon, Myanmar|year=1992|url=http://www.myanmarnet.net/nibbana/gotama/gcobv12.htm#22}} Kakusandha Buddha is one of the ancient Buddhas whose biography is chronicled in chapter 22 of the Buddhavamsa, one of the books of the Pāli Canon.

The base of a Pillar of Ashoka has been discovered at Gotihawa, and it has been suggested that it is the original base of the Nigali Sagar pillar fragments, found a few miles away, which contain an inscription of Ashoka (3rd century BCE).{{cite journal |last1=Irwin |first1=John |title='Aśokan' Pillars: A Reassessment of the Evidence-II: Structure |journal=The Burlington Magazine |date=1974 |volume=116 |issue=861 |page=721 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/877843 |issn=0007-6287}}

File:Fragments of Gotihawa and Nigali sagar.jpg (right).]]

Gotihawa

History

References

Further reading