FOOTNOTES

FOOTNOTES[1]With the exception of Alexander, all the great conquerors who have crossed the Indus to invade India have sprung from provinces towards Tartary and Northern Persia.[2]According to Plutarch, seventy Asiatic cities at the least owed their origin to Alexander. Of those, forty can still be traced. Grote thinks the number is probably exaggerated, and disparages their importance.[3]In saying this, I do not forget that the Graeco-Baktrian kings at one time extended their sway in India even far beyond the parts conquered by Alexander; but this cannot be regarded as having resulted from his invasion. It might have equally happened had his invasion been as mythical as the Indian expeditions of Dionysos and Heraklês. Nor do I by any means overlook the effects produced by Greek ideas on the Indian mind—effects which can be traced in a variety of spheres, such as religion, poetry, philosophy, science, architecture, and the plastic arts. On this subject Professor A. Weber read a very learned paper, entitled “Die Griechen in Indien,” before the Prussian Academy of Sciences in July 1890. It is a paper which well deserves to be translated into our language. Scholars now rather incline to believe that, whatever may be the exact degree of the indebtedness of India to Greece, the ancient civilization of India was much less original and self-contained than it was at one time supposed to be.[4]Patroklês, who held an important command in the East under Seleukos Nikatôr and his son Antiochos I., stated, in a work (now lost) which included a description of India, that while the army of Alexander took but a very hasty view of everything (in India), Alexander himself took a more exact one, causing the whole country to be described by men well acquainted with it. This description, Patroklês says, was put into his hands by Xenoklês the Treasurer. On this subject Humboldt thus writes: “The Macedonian campaign, which opened so large and beautiful a portion of the earth to the influence of one sole highly-gifted race, may therefore certainly be regarded in the strictest sense of the word as ascientificexpedition, and, moreover, as the first in which a conqueror had surrounded himself with men learned in all departments of science, as naturalists, geometricians, historians, philosophers, and artists.”[5]The editors ofAlexander in India, however, say that this rhetorician must have flourished early under Claudius, who reigned fromA.D.41 to 54. They add that the Latin of Curtius agrees well with this view, which would place him between Velleius and Petronius.[6]The author of thePeriplousof the Erythraian Sea also conducts Alexander to the Ganges. So too does Lucan—Pharsalia, x. 33.[7]Sainte-Croix and Professor Freeman both express strong doubts of the authenticity of Alexander’s letters quoted by several writers.[8]In Persian,Kshatrapa.[9]The Macedonian line in this part of the field being broken, some of the Indians and of the Persian cavalry burst through the gap and fought their way to the enemy’s baggage, where a desperate conflict ensued.—Arrian, iii. 14.[10]General Chesney, commenting lately on these numbers, remarks that “numbers without discipline are, after a certain point, worse than useless, the men only get in each others’ way. This was especially the case in the battles of old times fought at close quarters.” “The biographers of Sir Charles Napier,” he continues, “have made a great point of the circumstance that at the battle of Meani the British force of less than 3000 men was opposed by 40,000 of the enemy who fought desperately for several hours. Now, the whole British loss in killed and wounded was under 300, so that, assuming every wound to have been inflicted by a separate sword or bullet, it follows that out of the 40,000 desperate fighters, 39,700 contributed nothing to the fighting.” In another passage he points out that an ancient battle was in some respects a much more formidable thing than a modern one. In the battle of old days the absence of noise, except the words of command, the tramp of men, and the clashing of armour, above all the closeness of one’s adversary, must have been of a kind to try the nerves much more than the rattle of musketry, the crashing of shells, and the thunder of the artillery in a modern battle. What we shall never get back to is hand-to-hand fighting at close quarters. It was this that made a battle so decisive in olden days, and caused the tremendous slaughter that used to be the fate of the beaten side. An ancient battle was really a very short affair. After the marshalling of the troops and the preliminary skirmishing of the cavalry and the archery practice of the light troops, in which a good deal of time would be taken up, the business must have been decided in a very few minutes when once the infantry actually engaged. The fact is that when two bodies of men meet with sword or spear, a prolonged contest is from the nature of the case impossible. In modern warfare when a battle is lost, a large part of the defeated army is already at a distance and gets off unharmed. But there was no escape for the man in armour, and when he turned his back his shield was no defence.[11]“Against Phoenicians, Egyptians, Babylonians, Alexander had no mission of vengeance; he might rather call on them to help him against the common foe.... If the gods of Attica had been wronged and insulted (by the Persians) so had the gods of Memphis and Babylon”.—Prof. Freeman,Historical Essays, ii. pp. 202, 203.[12]“From this unhappy time all the worst failings of Alexander become more strongly developed.... Impetuosity and self-exaltation now grew upon him till he could bear neither restraint nor opposition.”—Prof. Freeman,Historical Essays, ii. p. 206.[13]The Mêdos is now thePolvarand the Araxês the Bund-Amir.[14]Kinneir places the Ouxian passes to the north-west ofBebehan.[15]The narrow defile nearKaleh Safed(the white fort), some fifty miles to the north-west of Shiraz.[16]Curzon thinks that Pasargadai lay to the north-east of Persepolis at a distance of some thirty miles. For a discussion regarding their ruins and the tomb of Cyrus see his great work on Persia just published, vol. ii. pp. 70-92.[17]The release of these enormous treasure-hoards produced such effects as resulted in recent times from the discoveries of gold in California and Australia. The prices of all commodities were greatly enhanced, and prosperity advanced by leaps and bounds.[18]Perhaps Damaghan, but its position is very uncertain. According to Apollodoros it was 1260 stadia beyond the Kaspian Gates, but according to Pliny only 133 miles. See Curzon’sPersia, i. p. 287.[19]Sari, according to Droysen.[20]“Edicto vetuit ne quis se praeter Apellem Pingeret, aut alius Lysippo duceret aera Fortis Alexandri vultum simulantia.”—Horace.[21]Pausanias, however, says that it was Philadelphos who brought the body to Alexandreia.[22]SeeNote Llin Appendix.[23]This name, transliterates the SanskritSubhagasena, which was not a personal name but an official title. See Lassen,Ind. Alt.II. p. 273.[24]The Companion Cavalry, called sometimes simply the Companions, were the Royal Horse Guards, a body which at the beginning of the campaign consisted of 1500 men, all scions of the noblest families of Macedonia and Thessaly. In the course of the war their numbers were augmented perhaps to 5000, as Mützell conjectures.[25]The Parai-tak-ênai possessed part of the mountainous country between the upper courses of the Oxus and the Jaxartes. They were perhaps one in race with the Takkas of India, who had a great and flourishing capital, Taxila (i.e.Takkasila, the Rock of the Takkas), situated between the Indus and Upper Hydaspes. The first part of their nameParairepresents perhaps the Sanskritparvata, a hill, orpahâr(a hill) of the common dialect. A tribe of the same name occupied a mountainous part of Media (Herod. i. 101), and another is located by Isidoros of Charax between Drangiana and Arachosia. Another form of the name is Paraitakai (Arrian, iii. 19; Strabo, xvi. 736; Stephanos Byz.)[26]The spring of 327B.C.[27]Kaukasos here denotes the lofty mountain range, now called the Central Hindu Kush, which forms the northern frontier of Kâbul. Its native designation was Parapamisos, or, as Ptolemy more correctly transliterates it, Paropanisos. Till Alexander’s time these mountains were altogether unknown to the Greeks. The officers of his army who wrote accounts of his Asiatic expedition sometimes considered them to be a continuation of the Tauros, and sometimes of the Kaukasos. Arrian, who regarded them as an extension of the former range, says that the Macedonian soldiers called them Kaukasos to flatter Alexander, as if, when he had crossed them to enter Baktria, he had carried his victorious arms beyond Kaukasos. The Greeks of those days, it must be observed, had no definite knowledge of the mountains to which that name was properly applicable, but vaguely conceived them to be the loftiest and the remotest to be found in the eastern parts of the world. The pass by which Alexander recrossed the Paropanisos was most probably the Kushan or Ghorbund Pass.[28]SeeNote A, Alexandreia under Kaukasos.[29]The tribes collectively designated Parapamisadai were, according to Ptolemy (who calls them Paropanisadai), the five following:—The Bôlitai, Aristophyloi, Parsioi, Parsyêtai, and Ambautai. They lived along the spurs of the Hindu Kush, chiefly along its southern and eastern sides. They thus occupied the whole of Kabulistân, and part of Afghânistân. The Bôlitai were probably the people of Kâbul, a city which, no doubt, represents that which Ptolemy calls Karoura (Kaboura?) or Ortospana.[30]The colonies which Alexander planted in the countries he overran were of a military character, designed to secure the permanence, cohesion, and ultimate unification of his conquests. The war-worn soldiers whom he made colonists were condemned to perpetual exile, as may be gathered from the fate which overtook the colonists who of their own accord left Baktra and attempted to return to Greece. They were treated as deserters, and were all put to death.[31]This is the Kâbul river, called otherwise by the classical writers theKôphês, except by Ptolemy, who calls it theKôa. Its name in Sanskrit is theKubhâ.[32]SeeNote B.[33]Taxilês. His distinctive name, as we learn from Curtius (viii. 14), was Omphis. Diodôros (xvii. 86) less accurately calls him Môphis, and says that Alexander changed his name to Taxiles. This is, however, a mistake, for Taxiles was a territorial title which each sovereign of Taxila assumed on his accession to power. Indian princes are generally designated in the classics by their territorial or dynastic titles. The father of Omphis died about the time Alexander was making his preparations to invade India.[34]Kleitos had been killed before the army left Baktra, but his brigade continued to bear his name even after his death.[35]Peukelaôtis designated both a district and its capital city. The name is a transliteration of Pukkalaoti, which is the Pali form of the Sanskrit Pushkalavati, the name by which the ancient capital of Gândhâra was known. General Cunningham has fixed its position at the two large towns of Parang and Chârsada, which form part of Hashtnagar, oreight cities, that are seated close together on the eastern bank of the Landaï or lower Swât river. The position thus indicated is nearly seventeen miles to the north-west of Peshâwar. The city was in early times a great emporium of commerce. Ptolemy, who with the author of the Periplûs of the Erythraian sea, calls it Proklaïs, has correctly located it on the eastern bank of the river of Souastênê,i.e.the river of Swât. Wilson, however, and Abbott take Pekhely (or Pakholi) in the neighbourhood of Peshâwar to be the modern representative of the old Gândhârian capital (v.Cunningham’sAnc. Geog. of India, pp. 49-51).[36]The route assigned to this division lay along the course of the Kâbul river and through the Khaiber Pass to Peukelaôtis, which was situated where, or near where, Hasht-nagar on the river Landaï now stands.[37]This name is perhaps a transliteration of the SanskritSanjaya, which meansvictor. A Shinwâri tribe calledSanguis found inhabiting a part of the Nangrihar district west of the Khaiber Pass.[38]The hypaspists, so called because they carried the round shield calledaspis, while the hoplites carried the oblong shield calledhoplon, formed a body of about 3000 men at the outset of the war, but were perhaps augmented to double that number during its progress. They were not so heavily armed as the hoplites, and were therefore more rapid in their movements. The foot companions were another distinguished corps of guards. The Agrianians, who made excellent light-armed troops, were a Paionian people whose country adjoined the sources of the river Strymôn.[39]Aspasioi and Assakênoi. SeeNote C.[40]Strabo (xv. 697) states the reasons which led Alexander to select the northern route to the Indus in preference to the southern. “Alexander was informed,” he says, “that the mountainous and northern parts were the most habitable and fertile, but that the southern part was either without water or liable to be overflowed by rivers at one time, or entirely burnt up at another, more fit to be the haunts of wild beasts than the dwellings of men. He resolved therefore to master first that part of India which had been well spoken of, considering at the same time that the rivers which it was necessary to pass, and which flowed transversely through the country which he proposed to attack, would be crossed with more facility towards their sources.” The districts through which he passed are now called Kafiristan, Chittral, Swât, and the Yusufzai country. It is more difficult to trace in this than in any other of his campaigns the course of his movements, and to identify with certainty the various strongholds which he attacked. The country through which he passed is but little known even at the present day, and, as Bunbury remarks, a glance at the labyrinth of mountains and valleys, which occupy the whole space in question in the best modern maps, will sufficiently show how utterly bewildering they must have been to the officers of Alexander, who neither used maps nor the compass, and were incapable of the simplest geographical observations. The time occupied by Alexander in marching from the foot of Kaukasos to the Indus was about a year. Like Napoleon, he kept the field even in winter, though in these parts the cold at that season is intense.[41]Khôês. This is the first river Alexander would reach after he had left his encampment near the junction of the Panjshîr with the Kôphên, which appears to have been the place where he divided his army. It cannot have been, as Lassen thought, the Kamah or Kunâr, but is rather the stream formed by the junction of the Alishang and the Alinghar, which joins the Kôphên on the left in the neighbourhood of Mandrour above Jalâlâbâd. The Alinghar river, as we learn from Masson, is called also theKow. The Kôa of Ptolemy must not be confounded with the Khôês of the text, for that author in describing the Kôa says that it receives a tributary from the Paropanisadai, and that after being joined by the Souastos (the river of Swât) it falls into the Indus. The Kôa is therefore probably the Kôphên after its reception of the Kamah or Kunâr river.[42]Euaspla R. This name, which, so far as I know, occurs only in Arrian, has not been satisfactorily explained. It designated, no doubt, the river which Aristotle, Strabo, and Curtius call the Choaspes, and which the best authorities identify with the Kamah or Kunâr, a river which rivals the Kôphên itself in the volume of its waters and the length of its course. It rises at the foot of the plateau of Pamîr, not far from the sources of the Oxus, and joins the Kôphên at some distance below Jalâlâbâd. Strabo says that the Choaspes traverses Bandobênê (Badakshan) and Gandarîtis after having passed near the towns of Plêgêrion and Gorydalê.[43]The capital of this chief was probably Gorys on the Choaspes.[44]Arigaion. This place, which was situated to the east of the Choaspes, is perhaps now represented by Naoghi, a village in the province of Bajore. Ritter identified it with Bajore or Bagawar, the capital of this province. The mountains to which the inhabitants fled for refuge may perhaps, as V. de Saint-Martin suggests, be those which Justin (xii. 7) calls Daedali, whereto he says Alexander led his troops after the Bacchanalian revelry with which they had been indulged at Nysa. There is no mention elsewhere of Arigaion, unless it be the “Argacum urbem” of theItiner. Alex.105. It is taken by Schneider to be the Acadira of Curtius.[45]The Gouraios is the river Pañjkora, which unites with the river of Swât to form the Landaï, a large affluent of the Kâbul river. It appears under the name of theGauriin the sixth book of theMahâbhârata, where it is mentioned along with the Suvâstu (the Swât river) and the Kampanâ. It owes its name to theGhori, a great and wide-spread tribe, branches of which are still to be found on the Pañjkora, and also on both sides of the Kâbul River where it is joined by the Landaï. It formed the boundary between the Gouraians and the Assakênians.[46]Mazaga. SeeNote D.[47]Alexander seems to have treated these mercenaries with less than his usual generosity towards brave enemies. Plutarch reprobates his slaughter of them as a foul blot on his military fame. The attack upon the city after it had capitulated on terms admits of no justification.[48]SeeNote E.[49]Abisares. Arrian in a subsequent passage calls this chief King of the Mountaineer Indians. His name shows that he ruled over Abhisâra, that region of mountain-girt valleys, now called Hazâra, which lies between the Indus and the upper Hydaspes. InHazârathe ancient name of the country seems to be preserved. It has been supposed, but less reasonably, that the district was so called from the great number of its petty chiefs,hazârabeing the numeral fora thousand(in Persian). Abisares was a very powerful prince, and it is supposed with reason that Kâshmîr was subject to his sway.[50]Aornos. SeeNote F.[51]“Heraklês,” says Herodotos (ii. 43, 44), “is one of the ancient gods of the Egyptians, and, as they say themselves, it was 17,000 years before the reign of Amasis, when the number of their gods was increased from eight to twelve, of whom Heraklês was accounted one. And being desirous of obtaining certain information from whatever source I could, I sailed to Tyre in Phoenicia, where, as I had been informed, there was a temple dedicated to Heraklês.” The name of the Egyptian Heraklês was Dsona or Chôn, or, according to Pausanias, Makeris, and that of the Tyrian was Melkart. These were more ancient than the Theban Heraklês, the son of Zeus and Alkmênê. The Indian Heraklês, called Dorsanes, who, according to Arrian, was the father of Pandaia, has been identified with Śiva, but also with Balarâma, the eighth avatâr of Vishnu. Diodôros (ii. 39) ascribes to him the building of the walls and of the palace of Palibothra (now Pâtnâ). Arrian in the second book of this work (c. 16) distinguishes the Tyrian Heraklês from the Egyptian and Argive or Theban. The latter, he says, lived about the time of Oidipous, son of Laios.[52]The Olympic stadium, which was the chief Greek measure for itinerary distances, was equal to 600 Greek feet, 625 Roman feet, and 606 feet 9 inches English. The stadium of this length was the only one in use before the third century of our aera.[53]The site of Orobatis must be sought for in the district west of Peukelaôtis, through which Hêphaistiôn advanced on his way to the Indus. The position and name of Arabutt, a village in this locality where ruins exist, plainly show its identity with the Orobatis of the text. It is situated on the left bank of the Landaï, and is near Naoshera. It is probably the Oroppa of the Ravenna geographer.[54]Nikanor was succeeded in this office by Philippos, who was placed in command of the garrison of Peukelaôtis.[55]Peukelaôtis, as has been stated, stood on the Landaï at a distance of seventeen miles north-west from Peshâwar. Alexander after the fall of Bazira moved westwards toward that river, judging it expedient before attacking the Rock to reduce all the yet unconquered region west of the Indus. He took Peukelaôtis, and then directed his march eastward till he approached the embouchure of the Kôphên, whence turning northwards he advanced up the right bank of the Indus till he reached Embolima, about eight miles distant from Aornos, and as high up the river as an army could go.[56]Kôphaios, to judge from his name and from what is here stated, must have been the ruler of the valley of the lower Kôphên or Kâbul river. Hence it is unlikely, as some have supposed, that the dominions of Taxilês lay partly in the country west of the Indus. I find nothing anywhere in the classical writers lending countenance to such a supposition. The name of Assagetes is probably a transliteration into Greek of the SanskritAśvajit, “gaining horses by conquest.”[57]Ritter taking Embolima to be a word of Greek origin, equivalent in meaning to ἐκβολή, “the mouth of a river,” thought that this place lay opposite to Attak, in the angle of land where the Kôphên discharges into the Indus, and was thus led to identify Aornos with the hill in that locality on which the fort of Raja Hodi stands. Embolima appears, however, to be rather a combination of two native names, Amb and Balimah. Amb is the name of a fort, now in ruins, from which runs the ordinary path up to the summit of Mahâban. It crowns a position of remarkable strength, which faces Derbend, a small town on the opposite side of the Indus. Not far westward from this fort, and on the same spur of the Mahâban, there is another fort also in ruins, which preserves to this day in the tradition of the inhabitants the name of Balimah. It is in accordance with Indian custom thus to combine into one the names of two neighbouring places.[58]SeeNote F, Aornos.[59]“All this account,” says Abbott, who takes Aornos to be Mount Mahâban, “will answer well for the Mahâban, which is a mountain-table about five miles in length at summit, scarped on the east by tremendous precipices from which descends one large spur down upon the Indus between Sitana and Amb. The mountain spur being comparatively easy of ascent would not probably be contested by the natives, who would concentrate their power to oppose the Macedonians as they climbed the precipitous fall of the main summit. The great extent of the mountain, covered as it is with pine forest, would enable Ptolemy, under the guidance of natives, to gain any distant point of the summit without observation.”[60]His name seems a transliteration ofŚaśigupta, “protected by the moon.”[61]That is the eastern part of their country. He had already reduced the western and the capital Massaga.[62]On descending the Mahâban by its northern or western spurs, Alexander would have found himself in the valleys of Chumla and Buner. The fugitives from the rock would no doubt flee for shelter to these valleys or the mountains by which they were enclosed. Dyrta probably lay to the north of Mahâban, near the point where the Indus issues from the mountains. Court’s opinion that Dyrta was a place so far remote from the rock as Dir, which lies beyond the Pañjkora river, seems altogether improbable. Yet it is adopted by Lassen, though the regions in which Dir is situated had already been subdued.[63]“This road,” says Abbott, “was probably the path leading amongst precipices above and along the torrent of the Burindu, a river which, after watering the valleys of Buner and Chumla, flows into the Indus above Amb. The path even now is very difficult. This would have brought Alexander back to Amb.” On this route probably lay the pass which the chief called Eryx by Curtius and Aphrikes by Diodôros attempted, but unsuccessfully, to defend against Alexander. The river Burindu above mentioned may be identified with theParenosof the Greek writers.[64]In doing so they had of course to cross over to the left bank of the Indus.[65]Arrian in hisIndika(c. 14) has described the mode of elephant hunting practised by the Indians. It is still in vogue.[66]Abbott points out that at Amb large quantities of drift timber are yearly arrested at an eddy near Derbend. It is probable, he thinks, that the pine forest in those days descended lower down the river than it does at present. At one time forests of fine sisoo, mulberry, and willow timber grew along both banks of the Indus at that part of its course.[67]The bridge in all probability spanned the Indus near Attak, which stands on a steep and lofty part of the left bank about two miles below the junction of the Kâbul and Indus. The width of the latter river at the fortress of Attak is, according to Lieutenant Wood who measured it, 286 yards. A little lower down where the channel is usually spanned by a bridge of boats it varies, as stated by Vigne, from 80 to 120 yards. According to Cunningham, the bridge was made higher up the river, at Ohind. From Alexander’s campaign north of the Kâbul river, General Chesney (in a lecture at Simla) hints that amoralmay be drawn:—“We have been accustomed,” he says, “to consider the country north of the Kâbul river as virtually impregnable. The march of Alexander’s army is a practical proof to the contrary, and although he was not burdened with artillery, and had apparently only mule transport, yet the Greek soldiers all marched in heavy armour, which must have added greatly to the difficulties of warfare among those mountains. There is an obvious moral to be drawn by us from these incidents.”[68]SeeNote G, Nysa.[69]Mount Tmôlos, as we learn from Virgil, Ovid, and Pliny, was famous for its vines. It was therefore considered to be a favourite haunt of the wine-god.[70]As the Greek φ represents thebhof Sanskrit, his name would beAkubhi.[71]Ivy abounds, however, in Hazâra as well as in some other parts of India.[72]His other names were Bacchos, Iacchos, Lyaios, Lênaios, Evios, Bromios, and among the Romans Liber also.[73]Arrian writes to the same effect in hisIndika, c. 5: “When the Greeks noticed a cave in the dominions of the Paropamisadai, they asserted that it was the cave of Promêtheus the Titan, in which he had been suspended for stealing the fire.” At the distance of thirty-four miles from Birikot, a place near the river Swât, is Daityapûr, now called Daiti-Kalli, said to have been built by one of the Daityas,i.e.enemies of the gods, such as were the Titans of the Greeks. In the hill adjacent is a vast cavern which, as Abbott has suggested, the companions of Alexander may have taken to be the cave frequented by the eagle which preyed upon the vitals of Prometheus the Titan. At Bamiân, which lies on one of the routes from Kâbul to Baktria, there are some very notable caves, one of which, some think, must have been that which the Greeks took to be the cave of Promêtheus. But Alexander does not appear to have selected the Bamiân route either in crossing or recrossing the Kaukasos. The mountains of the real Kaukasos were the loftiest known to the Greeks before Alexander’s time, and hence to have crossed them was regarded as a transcendent achievement.[74]Arrian, like other ancient writers, supposed that the Indus had its sources in those mountains from which it emerges into the plains some sixty miles above Attak. It is now known that it rises in Tibet on a lofty Himalayan peak, Mount Kailâsa, famous in Hindu fable as the residence of Śiva and the Paradise of Kuvera, and that before it issues into the plains it has nearly run the half of its course of about 1800 miles. The number of its mouths has varied from time to time. Ptolemy, the geographer, gives it seven.[75]Pâtâla in Sanskrit mythology denotesthe underworld—the abode of snakes and demons—to which the sun at the close of day seems to descend. It was, therefore, Ritter says, the name applied by the Brahmans to all the provinces in India that lay towards sunset. Cunningham, however, suggests that Pâtali, a Sanskrit word meaningthe trumpet-flower(bignonia suaveolens) may have given its name to the Delta “in allusion,” he says, “to the ‘trumpet’ shape of the province included between the eastern and western branches of the mouth of the Indus, as the two branches as they approach the sea curve outwards like the mouth of a trumpet.” But could the idea of such a resemblance have occurred to the minds of the Indians unless maps were in use among them? For a better etymology seeNote U. It has been conclusively proved that Haidarâbâd is the modern representative of the ancient Pâtâla.[76]The Indus after receiving the united streams of the great Panjâb rivers is increased in breadth from 600 to 2000 feet. Its breadth is therefore grossly exaggerated here unless the extent to which its inundations spread beyond its banks enters into the account.[77]SeeNote H.[78]The Afghans and Rajputs are still noted for their great stature.[79]The Greek geographers derived the name of the Aethiopians from αἴθω,I burn, and ὦψ,the visage, and applied it to all the sun-burnt, dark-complexioned races south of Egypt. As the Aethiopic language is, however, purely Semitic, the name, if indigenous, must also be Semitic, since, as Salt states, the Abyssinians to this day call themselves Itiopjawan. Herodotus (vii. 70) speaks of Asiatic Aethiopians. These served in the army which Darius led into Greece, and were marshalled with the Indians, and did not at all differ from the others in appearance, but only in their language and in their hair, which was straight, while that of the Aethiopians of Libya (Africa) was woolly.[80]The Persians were originally the inhabitants of that poor and insignificant province called Persis, which was included between the Persian Gulf in the south and Mêdia in the north, and which stretched eastward from Susiana (Elam) to the deserts of Karmania. The great empire won by their arms, extended from the Mediterranean to the Jaxartes and Indus. Xenophon says that the Persians in early times led a life of penury and hard toil, as they inhabited a rugged country which they cultivated with their own hands (Kyrop.vii. 5, 67).[81]Cyrus is said to have perished in this expedition against the Skythians, who lived beyond the Jaxartes, and were led by Queen Tomyris. The account of this expedition, given by Herodotos in the closing chapters of his first book, is examined at length by Duncker in the sixth volume of hisHistory of Antiquity, pp. 112-124. Xenophon represents Cyrus as dying in peace at an advanced age.[82]Called theIndika, written in the Ionic dialect, and based chiefly on the works (now lost) of Megasthenes and Nearchos.[83]The Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf, in contrast to the interior sea or Mediterranean.[84]By the Indian Ocean (called immediately afterwards the Great Sea) is meant here the Bay of Bengal and the ocean beyond, then unknown, which extended to the shores of China. By the Kaukasos, which extended to this eastern ocean, is meant the vast Himâlayan range.

FOOTNOTES

[1]With the exception of Alexander, all the great conquerors who have crossed the Indus to invade India have sprung from provinces towards Tartary and Northern Persia.

[2]According to Plutarch, seventy Asiatic cities at the least owed their origin to Alexander. Of those, forty can still be traced. Grote thinks the number is probably exaggerated, and disparages their importance.

[3]In saying this, I do not forget that the Graeco-Baktrian kings at one time extended their sway in India even far beyond the parts conquered by Alexander; but this cannot be regarded as having resulted from his invasion. It might have equally happened had his invasion been as mythical as the Indian expeditions of Dionysos and Heraklês. Nor do I by any means overlook the effects produced by Greek ideas on the Indian mind—effects which can be traced in a variety of spheres, such as religion, poetry, philosophy, science, architecture, and the plastic arts. On this subject Professor A. Weber read a very learned paper, entitled “Die Griechen in Indien,” before the Prussian Academy of Sciences in July 1890. It is a paper which well deserves to be translated into our language. Scholars now rather incline to believe that, whatever may be the exact degree of the indebtedness of India to Greece, the ancient civilization of India was much less original and self-contained than it was at one time supposed to be.

[4]Patroklês, who held an important command in the East under Seleukos Nikatôr and his son Antiochos I., stated, in a work (now lost) which included a description of India, that while the army of Alexander took but a very hasty view of everything (in India), Alexander himself took a more exact one, causing the whole country to be described by men well acquainted with it. This description, Patroklês says, was put into his hands by Xenoklês the Treasurer. On this subject Humboldt thus writes: “The Macedonian campaign, which opened so large and beautiful a portion of the earth to the influence of one sole highly-gifted race, may therefore certainly be regarded in the strictest sense of the word as ascientificexpedition, and, moreover, as the first in which a conqueror had surrounded himself with men learned in all departments of science, as naturalists, geometricians, historians, philosophers, and artists.”

[5]The editors ofAlexander in India, however, say that this rhetorician must have flourished early under Claudius, who reigned fromA.D.41 to 54. They add that the Latin of Curtius agrees well with this view, which would place him between Velleius and Petronius.

[6]The author of thePeriplousof the Erythraian Sea also conducts Alexander to the Ganges. So too does Lucan—Pharsalia, x. 33.

[7]Sainte-Croix and Professor Freeman both express strong doubts of the authenticity of Alexander’s letters quoted by several writers.

[8]In Persian,Kshatrapa.

[9]The Macedonian line in this part of the field being broken, some of the Indians and of the Persian cavalry burst through the gap and fought their way to the enemy’s baggage, where a desperate conflict ensued.—Arrian, iii. 14.

[10]General Chesney, commenting lately on these numbers, remarks that “numbers without discipline are, after a certain point, worse than useless, the men only get in each others’ way. This was especially the case in the battles of old times fought at close quarters.” “The biographers of Sir Charles Napier,” he continues, “have made a great point of the circumstance that at the battle of Meani the British force of less than 3000 men was opposed by 40,000 of the enemy who fought desperately for several hours. Now, the whole British loss in killed and wounded was under 300, so that, assuming every wound to have been inflicted by a separate sword or bullet, it follows that out of the 40,000 desperate fighters, 39,700 contributed nothing to the fighting.” In another passage he points out that an ancient battle was in some respects a much more formidable thing than a modern one. In the battle of old days the absence of noise, except the words of command, the tramp of men, and the clashing of armour, above all the closeness of one’s adversary, must have been of a kind to try the nerves much more than the rattle of musketry, the crashing of shells, and the thunder of the artillery in a modern battle. What we shall never get back to is hand-to-hand fighting at close quarters. It was this that made a battle so decisive in olden days, and caused the tremendous slaughter that used to be the fate of the beaten side. An ancient battle was really a very short affair. After the marshalling of the troops and the preliminary skirmishing of the cavalry and the archery practice of the light troops, in which a good deal of time would be taken up, the business must have been decided in a very few minutes when once the infantry actually engaged. The fact is that when two bodies of men meet with sword or spear, a prolonged contest is from the nature of the case impossible. In modern warfare when a battle is lost, a large part of the defeated army is already at a distance and gets off unharmed. But there was no escape for the man in armour, and when he turned his back his shield was no defence.

[11]“Against Phoenicians, Egyptians, Babylonians, Alexander had no mission of vengeance; he might rather call on them to help him against the common foe.... If the gods of Attica had been wronged and insulted (by the Persians) so had the gods of Memphis and Babylon”.—Prof. Freeman,Historical Essays, ii. pp. 202, 203.

[12]“From this unhappy time all the worst failings of Alexander become more strongly developed.... Impetuosity and self-exaltation now grew upon him till he could bear neither restraint nor opposition.”—Prof. Freeman,Historical Essays, ii. p. 206.

[13]The Mêdos is now thePolvarand the Araxês the Bund-Amir.

[14]Kinneir places the Ouxian passes to the north-west ofBebehan.

[15]The narrow defile nearKaleh Safed(the white fort), some fifty miles to the north-west of Shiraz.

[16]Curzon thinks that Pasargadai lay to the north-east of Persepolis at a distance of some thirty miles. For a discussion regarding their ruins and the tomb of Cyrus see his great work on Persia just published, vol. ii. pp. 70-92.

[17]The release of these enormous treasure-hoards produced such effects as resulted in recent times from the discoveries of gold in California and Australia. The prices of all commodities were greatly enhanced, and prosperity advanced by leaps and bounds.

[18]Perhaps Damaghan, but its position is very uncertain. According to Apollodoros it was 1260 stadia beyond the Kaspian Gates, but according to Pliny only 133 miles. See Curzon’sPersia, i. p. 287.

[19]Sari, according to Droysen.

[20]“Edicto vetuit ne quis se praeter Apellem Pingeret, aut alius Lysippo duceret aera Fortis Alexandri vultum simulantia.”—Horace.

[21]Pausanias, however, says that it was Philadelphos who brought the body to Alexandreia.

[22]SeeNote Llin Appendix.

[23]This name, transliterates the SanskritSubhagasena, which was not a personal name but an official title. See Lassen,Ind. Alt.II. p. 273.

[24]The Companion Cavalry, called sometimes simply the Companions, were the Royal Horse Guards, a body which at the beginning of the campaign consisted of 1500 men, all scions of the noblest families of Macedonia and Thessaly. In the course of the war their numbers were augmented perhaps to 5000, as Mützell conjectures.

[25]The Parai-tak-ênai possessed part of the mountainous country between the upper courses of the Oxus and the Jaxartes. They were perhaps one in race with the Takkas of India, who had a great and flourishing capital, Taxila (i.e.Takkasila, the Rock of the Takkas), situated between the Indus and Upper Hydaspes. The first part of their nameParairepresents perhaps the Sanskritparvata, a hill, orpahâr(a hill) of the common dialect. A tribe of the same name occupied a mountainous part of Media (Herod. i. 101), and another is located by Isidoros of Charax between Drangiana and Arachosia. Another form of the name is Paraitakai (Arrian, iii. 19; Strabo, xvi. 736; Stephanos Byz.)

[26]The spring of 327B.C.

[27]Kaukasos here denotes the lofty mountain range, now called the Central Hindu Kush, which forms the northern frontier of Kâbul. Its native designation was Parapamisos, or, as Ptolemy more correctly transliterates it, Paropanisos. Till Alexander’s time these mountains were altogether unknown to the Greeks. The officers of his army who wrote accounts of his Asiatic expedition sometimes considered them to be a continuation of the Tauros, and sometimes of the Kaukasos. Arrian, who regarded them as an extension of the former range, says that the Macedonian soldiers called them Kaukasos to flatter Alexander, as if, when he had crossed them to enter Baktria, he had carried his victorious arms beyond Kaukasos. The Greeks of those days, it must be observed, had no definite knowledge of the mountains to which that name was properly applicable, but vaguely conceived them to be the loftiest and the remotest to be found in the eastern parts of the world. The pass by which Alexander recrossed the Paropanisos was most probably the Kushan or Ghorbund Pass.

[28]SeeNote A, Alexandreia under Kaukasos.

[29]The tribes collectively designated Parapamisadai were, according to Ptolemy (who calls them Paropanisadai), the five following:—The Bôlitai, Aristophyloi, Parsioi, Parsyêtai, and Ambautai. They lived along the spurs of the Hindu Kush, chiefly along its southern and eastern sides. They thus occupied the whole of Kabulistân, and part of Afghânistân. The Bôlitai were probably the people of Kâbul, a city which, no doubt, represents that which Ptolemy calls Karoura (Kaboura?) or Ortospana.

[30]The colonies which Alexander planted in the countries he overran were of a military character, designed to secure the permanence, cohesion, and ultimate unification of his conquests. The war-worn soldiers whom he made colonists were condemned to perpetual exile, as may be gathered from the fate which overtook the colonists who of their own accord left Baktra and attempted to return to Greece. They were treated as deserters, and were all put to death.

[31]This is the Kâbul river, called otherwise by the classical writers theKôphês, except by Ptolemy, who calls it theKôa. Its name in Sanskrit is theKubhâ.

[32]SeeNote B.

[33]Taxilês. His distinctive name, as we learn from Curtius (viii. 14), was Omphis. Diodôros (xvii. 86) less accurately calls him Môphis, and says that Alexander changed his name to Taxiles. This is, however, a mistake, for Taxiles was a territorial title which each sovereign of Taxila assumed on his accession to power. Indian princes are generally designated in the classics by their territorial or dynastic titles. The father of Omphis died about the time Alexander was making his preparations to invade India.

[34]Kleitos had been killed before the army left Baktra, but his brigade continued to bear his name even after his death.

[35]Peukelaôtis designated both a district and its capital city. The name is a transliteration of Pukkalaoti, which is the Pali form of the Sanskrit Pushkalavati, the name by which the ancient capital of Gândhâra was known. General Cunningham has fixed its position at the two large towns of Parang and Chârsada, which form part of Hashtnagar, oreight cities, that are seated close together on the eastern bank of the Landaï or lower Swât river. The position thus indicated is nearly seventeen miles to the north-west of Peshâwar. The city was in early times a great emporium of commerce. Ptolemy, who with the author of the Periplûs of the Erythraian sea, calls it Proklaïs, has correctly located it on the eastern bank of the river of Souastênê,i.e.the river of Swât. Wilson, however, and Abbott take Pekhely (or Pakholi) in the neighbourhood of Peshâwar to be the modern representative of the old Gândhârian capital (v.Cunningham’sAnc. Geog. of India, pp. 49-51).

[36]The route assigned to this division lay along the course of the Kâbul river and through the Khaiber Pass to Peukelaôtis, which was situated where, or near where, Hasht-nagar on the river Landaï now stands.

[37]This name is perhaps a transliteration of the SanskritSanjaya, which meansvictor. A Shinwâri tribe calledSanguis found inhabiting a part of the Nangrihar district west of the Khaiber Pass.

[38]The hypaspists, so called because they carried the round shield calledaspis, while the hoplites carried the oblong shield calledhoplon, formed a body of about 3000 men at the outset of the war, but were perhaps augmented to double that number during its progress. They were not so heavily armed as the hoplites, and were therefore more rapid in their movements. The foot companions were another distinguished corps of guards. The Agrianians, who made excellent light-armed troops, were a Paionian people whose country adjoined the sources of the river Strymôn.

[39]Aspasioi and Assakênoi. SeeNote C.

[40]Strabo (xv. 697) states the reasons which led Alexander to select the northern route to the Indus in preference to the southern. “Alexander was informed,” he says, “that the mountainous and northern parts were the most habitable and fertile, but that the southern part was either without water or liable to be overflowed by rivers at one time, or entirely burnt up at another, more fit to be the haunts of wild beasts than the dwellings of men. He resolved therefore to master first that part of India which had been well spoken of, considering at the same time that the rivers which it was necessary to pass, and which flowed transversely through the country which he proposed to attack, would be crossed with more facility towards their sources.” The districts through which he passed are now called Kafiristan, Chittral, Swât, and the Yusufzai country. It is more difficult to trace in this than in any other of his campaigns the course of his movements, and to identify with certainty the various strongholds which he attacked. The country through which he passed is but little known even at the present day, and, as Bunbury remarks, a glance at the labyrinth of mountains and valleys, which occupy the whole space in question in the best modern maps, will sufficiently show how utterly bewildering they must have been to the officers of Alexander, who neither used maps nor the compass, and were incapable of the simplest geographical observations. The time occupied by Alexander in marching from the foot of Kaukasos to the Indus was about a year. Like Napoleon, he kept the field even in winter, though in these parts the cold at that season is intense.

[41]Khôês. This is the first river Alexander would reach after he had left his encampment near the junction of the Panjshîr with the Kôphên, which appears to have been the place where he divided his army. It cannot have been, as Lassen thought, the Kamah or Kunâr, but is rather the stream formed by the junction of the Alishang and the Alinghar, which joins the Kôphên on the left in the neighbourhood of Mandrour above Jalâlâbâd. The Alinghar river, as we learn from Masson, is called also theKow. The Kôa of Ptolemy must not be confounded with the Khôês of the text, for that author in describing the Kôa says that it receives a tributary from the Paropanisadai, and that after being joined by the Souastos (the river of Swât) it falls into the Indus. The Kôa is therefore probably the Kôphên after its reception of the Kamah or Kunâr river.

[42]Euaspla R. This name, which, so far as I know, occurs only in Arrian, has not been satisfactorily explained. It designated, no doubt, the river which Aristotle, Strabo, and Curtius call the Choaspes, and which the best authorities identify with the Kamah or Kunâr, a river which rivals the Kôphên itself in the volume of its waters and the length of its course. It rises at the foot of the plateau of Pamîr, not far from the sources of the Oxus, and joins the Kôphên at some distance below Jalâlâbâd. Strabo says that the Choaspes traverses Bandobênê (Badakshan) and Gandarîtis after having passed near the towns of Plêgêrion and Gorydalê.

[43]The capital of this chief was probably Gorys on the Choaspes.

[44]Arigaion. This place, which was situated to the east of the Choaspes, is perhaps now represented by Naoghi, a village in the province of Bajore. Ritter identified it with Bajore or Bagawar, the capital of this province. The mountains to which the inhabitants fled for refuge may perhaps, as V. de Saint-Martin suggests, be those which Justin (xii. 7) calls Daedali, whereto he says Alexander led his troops after the Bacchanalian revelry with which they had been indulged at Nysa. There is no mention elsewhere of Arigaion, unless it be the “Argacum urbem” of theItiner. Alex.105. It is taken by Schneider to be the Acadira of Curtius.

[45]The Gouraios is the river Pañjkora, which unites with the river of Swât to form the Landaï, a large affluent of the Kâbul river. It appears under the name of theGauriin the sixth book of theMahâbhârata, where it is mentioned along with the Suvâstu (the Swât river) and the Kampanâ. It owes its name to theGhori, a great and wide-spread tribe, branches of which are still to be found on the Pañjkora, and also on both sides of the Kâbul River where it is joined by the Landaï. It formed the boundary between the Gouraians and the Assakênians.

[46]Mazaga. SeeNote D.

[47]Alexander seems to have treated these mercenaries with less than his usual generosity towards brave enemies. Plutarch reprobates his slaughter of them as a foul blot on his military fame. The attack upon the city after it had capitulated on terms admits of no justification.

[48]SeeNote E.

[49]Abisares. Arrian in a subsequent passage calls this chief King of the Mountaineer Indians. His name shows that he ruled over Abhisâra, that region of mountain-girt valleys, now called Hazâra, which lies between the Indus and the upper Hydaspes. InHazârathe ancient name of the country seems to be preserved. It has been supposed, but less reasonably, that the district was so called from the great number of its petty chiefs,hazârabeing the numeral fora thousand(in Persian). Abisares was a very powerful prince, and it is supposed with reason that Kâshmîr was subject to his sway.

[50]Aornos. SeeNote F.

[51]“Heraklês,” says Herodotos (ii. 43, 44), “is one of the ancient gods of the Egyptians, and, as they say themselves, it was 17,000 years before the reign of Amasis, when the number of their gods was increased from eight to twelve, of whom Heraklês was accounted one. And being desirous of obtaining certain information from whatever source I could, I sailed to Tyre in Phoenicia, where, as I had been informed, there was a temple dedicated to Heraklês.” The name of the Egyptian Heraklês was Dsona or Chôn, or, according to Pausanias, Makeris, and that of the Tyrian was Melkart. These were more ancient than the Theban Heraklês, the son of Zeus and Alkmênê. The Indian Heraklês, called Dorsanes, who, according to Arrian, was the father of Pandaia, has been identified with Śiva, but also with Balarâma, the eighth avatâr of Vishnu. Diodôros (ii. 39) ascribes to him the building of the walls and of the palace of Palibothra (now Pâtnâ). Arrian in the second book of this work (c. 16) distinguishes the Tyrian Heraklês from the Egyptian and Argive or Theban. The latter, he says, lived about the time of Oidipous, son of Laios.

[52]The Olympic stadium, which was the chief Greek measure for itinerary distances, was equal to 600 Greek feet, 625 Roman feet, and 606 feet 9 inches English. The stadium of this length was the only one in use before the third century of our aera.

[53]The site of Orobatis must be sought for in the district west of Peukelaôtis, through which Hêphaistiôn advanced on his way to the Indus. The position and name of Arabutt, a village in this locality where ruins exist, plainly show its identity with the Orobatis of the text. It is situated on the left bank of the Landaï, and is near Naoshera. It is probably the Oroppa of the Ravenna geographer.

[54]Nikanor was succeeded in this office by Philippos, who was placed in command of the garrison of Peukelaôtis.

[55]Peukelaôtis, as has been stated, stood on the Landaï at a distance of seventeen miles north-west from Peshâwar. Alexander after the fall of Bazira moved westwards toward that river, judging it expedient before attacking the Rock to reduce all the yet unconquered region west of the Indus. He took Peukelaôtis, and then directed his march eastward till he approached the embouchure of the Kôphên, whence turning northwards he advanced up the right bank of the Indus till he reached Embolima, about eight miles distant from Aornos, and as high up the river as an army could go.

[56]Kôphaios, to judge from his name and from what is here stated, must have been the ruler of the valley of the lower Kôphên or Kâbul river. Hence it is unlikely, as some have supposed, that the dominions of Taxilês lay partly in the country west of the Indus. I find nothing anywhere in the classical writers lending countenance to such a supposition. The name of Assagetes is probably a transliteration into Greek of the SanskritAśvajit, “gaining horses by conquest.”

[57]Ritter taking Embolima to be a word of Greek origin, equivalent in meaning to ἐκβολή, “the mouth of a river,” thought that this place lay opposite to Attak, in the angle of land where the Kôphên discharges into the Indus, and was thus led to identify Aornos with the hill in that locality on which the fort of Raja Hodi stands. Embolima appears, however, to be rather a combination of two native names, Amb and Balimah. Amb is the name of a fort, now in ruins, from which runs the ordinary path up to the summit of Mahâban. It crowns a position of remarkable strength, which faces Derbend, a small town on the opposite side of the Indus. Not far westward from this fort, and on the same spur of the Mahâban, there is another fort also in ruins, which preserves to this day in the tradition of the inhabitants the name of Balimah. It is in accordance with Indian custom thus to combine into one the names of two neighbouring places.

[58]SeeNote F, Aornos.

[59]“All this account,” says Abbott, who takes Aornos to be Mount Mahâban, “will answer well for the Mahâban, which is a mountain-table about five miles in length at summit, scarped on the east by tremendous precipices from which descends one large spur down upon the Indus between Sitana and Amb. The mountain spur being comparatively easy of ascent would not probably be contested by the natives, who would concentrate their power to oppose the Macedonians as they climbed the precipitous fall of the main summit. The great extent of the mountain, covered as it is with pine forest, would enable Ptolemy, under the guidance of natives, to gain any distant point of the summit without observation.”

[60]His name seems a transliteration ofŚaśigupta, “protected by the moon.”

[61]That is the eastern part of their country. He had already reduced the western and the capital Massaga.

[62]On descending the Mahâban by its northern or western spurs, Alexander would have found himself in the valleys of Chumla and Buner. The fugitives from the rock would no doubt flee for shelter to these valleys or the mountains by which they were enclosed. Dyrta probably lay to the north of Mahâban, near the point where the Indus issues from the mountains. Court’s opinion that Dyrta was a place so far remote from the rock as Dir, which lies beyond the Pañjkora river, seems altogether improbable. Yet it is adopted by Lassen, though the regions in which Dir is situated had already been subdued.

[63]“This road,” says Abbott, “was probably the path leading amongst precipices above and along the torrent of the Burindu, a river which, after watering the valleys of Buner and Chumla, flows into the Indus above Amb. The path even now is very difficult. This would have brought Alexander back to Amb.” On this route probably lay the pass which the chief called Eryx by Curtius and Aphrikes by Diodôros attempted, but unsuccessfully, to defend against Alexander. The river Burindu above mentioned may be identified with theParenosof the Greek writers.

[64]In doing so they had of course to cross over to the left bank of the Indus.

[65]Arrian in hisIndika(c. 14) has described the mode of elephant hunting practised by the Indians. It is still in vogue.

[66]Abbott points out that at Amb large quantities of drift timber are yearly arrested at an eddy near Derbend. It is probable, he thinks, that the pine forest in those days descended lower down the river than it does at present. At one time forests of fine sisoo, mulberry, and willow timber grew along both banks of the Indus at that part of its course.

[67]The bridge in all probability spanned the Indus near Attak, which stands on a steep and lofty part of the left bank about two miles below the junction of the Kâbul and Indus. The width of the latter river at the fortress of Attak is, according to Lieutenant Wood who measured it, 286 yards. A little lower down where the channel is usually spanned by a bridge of boats it varies, as stated by Vigne, from 80 to 120 yards. According to Cunningham, the bridge was made higher up the river, at Ohind. From Alexander’s campaign north of the Kâbul river, General Chesney (in a lecture at Simla) hints that amoralmay be drawn:—“We have been accustomed,” he says, “to consider the country north of the Kâbul river as virtually impregnable. The march of Alexander’s army is a practical proof to the contrary, and although he was not burdened with artillery, and had apparently only mule transport, yet the Greek soldiers all marched in heavy armour, which must have added greatly to the difficulties of warfare among those mountains. There is an obvious moral to be drawn by us from these incidents.”

[68]SeeNote G, Nysa.

[69]Mount Tmôlos, as we learn from Virgil, Ovid, and Pliny, was famous for its vines. It was therefore considered to be a favourite haunt of the wine-god.

[70]As the Greek φ represents thebhof Sanskrit, his name would beAkubhi.

[71]Ivy abounds, however, in Hazâra as well as in some other parts of India.

[72]His other names were Bacchos, Iacchos, Lyaios, Lênaios, Evios, Bromios, and among the Romans Liber also.

[73]Arrian writes to the same effect in hisIndika, c. 5: “When the Greeks noticed a cave in the dominions of the Paropamisadai, they asserted that it was the cave of Promêtheus the Titan, in which he had been suspended for stealing the fire.” At the distance of thirty-four miles from Birikot, a place near the river Swât, is Daityapûr, now called Daiti-Kalli, said to have been built by one of the Daityas,i.e.enemies of the gods, such as were the Titans of the Greeks. In the hill adjacent is a vast cavern which, as Abbott has suggested, the companions of Alexander may have taken to be the cave frequented by the eagle which preyed upon the vitals of Prometheus the Titan. At Bamiân, which lies on one of the routes from Kâbul to Baktria, there are some very notable caves, one of which, some think, must have been that which the Greeks took to be the cave of Promêtheus. But Alexander does not appear to have selected the Bamiân route either in crossing or recrossing the Kaukasos. The mountains of the real Kaukasos were the loftiest known to the Greeks before Alexander’s time, and hence to have crossed them was regarded as a transcendent achievement.

[74]Arrian, like other ancient writers, supposed that the Indus had its sources in those mountains from which it emerges into the plains some sixty miles above Attak. It is now known that it rises in Tibet on a lofty Himalayan peak, Mount Kailâsa, famous in Hindu fable as the residence of Śiva and the Paradise of Kuvera, and that before it issues into the plains it has nearly run the half of its course of about 1800 miles. The number of its mouths has varied from time to time. Ptolemy, the geographer, gives it seven.

[75]Pâtâla in Sanskrit mythology denotesthe underworld—the abode of snakes and demons—to which the sun at the close of day seems to descend. It was, therefore, Ritter says, the name applied by the Brahmans to all the provinces in India that lay towards sunset. Cunningham, however, suggests that Pâtali, a Sanskrit word meaningthe trumpet-flower(bignonia suaveolens) may have given its name to the Delta “in allusion,” he says, “to the ‘trumpet’ shape of the province included between the eastern and western branches of the mouth of the Indus, as the two branches as they approach the sea curve outwards like the mouth of a trumpet.” But could the idea of such a resemblance have occurred to the minds of the Indians unless maps were in use among them? For a better etymology seeNote U. It has been conclusively proved that Haidarâbâd is the modern representative of the ancient Pâtâla.

[76]The Indus after receiving the united streams of the great Panjâb rivers is increased in breadth from 600 to 2000 feet. Its breadth is therefore grossly exaggerated here unless the extent to which its inundations spread beyond its banks enters into the account.

[77]SeeNote H.

[78]The Afghans and Rajputs are still noted for their great stature.

[79]The Greek geographers derived the name of the Aethiopians from αἴθω,I burn, and ὦψ,the visage, and applied it to all the sun-burnt, dark-complexioned races south of Egypt. As the Aethiopic language is, however, purely Semitic, the name, if indigenous, must also be Semitic, since, as Salt states, the Abyssinians to this day call themselves Itiopjawan. Herodotus (vii. 70) speaks of Asiatic Aethiopians. These served in the army which Darius led into Greece, and were marshalled with the Indians, and did not at all differ from the others in appearance, but only in their language and in their hair, which was straight, while that of the Aethiopians of Libya (Africa) was woolly.

[80]The Persians were originally the inhabitants of that poor and insignificant province called Persis, which was included between the Persian Gulf in the south and Mêdia in the north, and which stretched eastward from Susiana (Elam) to the deserts of Karmania. The great empire won by their arms, extended from the Mediterranean to the Jaxartes and Indus. Xenophon says that the Persians in early times led a life of penury and hard toil, as they inhabited a rugged country which they cultivated with their own hands (Kyrop.vii. 5, 67).

[81]Cyrus is said to have perished in this expedition against the Skythians, who lived beyond the Jaxartes, and were led by Queen Tomyris. The account of this expedition, given by Herodotos in the closing chapters of his first book, is examined at length by Duncker in the sixth volume of hisHistory of Antiquity, pp. 112-124. Xenophon represents Cyrus as dying in peace at an advanced age.

[82]Called theIndika, written in the Ionic dialect, and based chiefly on the works (now lost) of Megasthenes and Nearchos.

[83]The Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf, in contrast to the interior sea or Mediterranean.

[84]By the Indian Ocean (called immediately afterwards the Great Sea) is meant here the Bay of Bengal and the ocean beyond, then unknown, which extended to the shores of China. By the Kaukasos, which extended to this eastern ocean, is meant the vast Himâlayan range.

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