Nepal

Lumbini — the birthplace of the Buddha

Lumbini, in the Terai plains of southern Nepal, is the birthplace of Siddhartha Gautama — the prince who became the Buddha — and one of the most sacred sites in the world for nearly half a billion Buddhists, protected since 249 BCE when the Mauryan Emperor Ashoka erected a pillar marking the spot.

Prithvi Narayan Shah — the unification of Nepal

Prithvi Narayan Shah's unification campaign (completed 1768 CE) created the Kingdom of Nepal from a patchwork of small hill states — beginning with his capture of the Kathmandu Valley, he built the foundation of the only Hindu kingdom that was never colonised by Europeans.

The Gurkha Wars — Nepal meets the British Empire

The Anglo-Nepalese War (1814–1816 CE) was the conflict in which the expanding British East India Company fought the Kingdom of Nepal to a near-stalemate — the Gurkha warriors' ferocity so impressed the British that the Treaty of Sugauli included a clause permitting recruitment of Gurkhas into the British Indian Army, beginning a partnership that has lasted over two centuries.

Everest measured — the highest point on Earth

The Great Trigonometric Survey of India identified Peak XV (later Everest) as the world's highest mountain in 1852 CE — calculated by George Everest's successor Andrew Waugh using observations from six stations 150 kilometres away, yielding a height of 29,002 feet (later refined), with the mountain named for George Everest over the objections of Everest himself.

Conquest of Everest — the roof of the world reached

Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay's first ascent of Mount Everest (8,849 metres) on 29 May 1953 was announced on the day of Queen Elizabeth II's coronation — the New Zealander and the Sherpa from Nepal had achieved what mountaineers had attempted for 32 years and dozens of lives.

Nepal abolishes the monarchy — the world's last Hindu kingdom ends

Nepal's Constituent Assembly abolished the 240-year-old Shah dynasty and declared a Federal Democratic Republic on 28 May 2008 CE — ending the world's last Hindu kingdom in a revolution driven by a decade-long Maoist insurgency, the 2001 royal massacre, and a popular movement that stripped the king of power in 2006.