Jainism Early Faith of Ashoka

Author(s): Edward Thomas
Publisher: Trubner and Company London

Page 30

18
BACTRIAN COINS AND INDIAN DATES.
that, recognizing the imitative adoption of certain details of the main devices of the suzerain rulers, and supposing such adoption to have been immediate and contemporaneous, the dates B.C. 37 to A.D. 4 would "mark the age of Heraüs.” This epoch singularly accords with the date of Isidore of Charax, from whose text of the Stathmi Parthici' we likewise gather that the recognized seat of the Şaka-Scythians, then feudatories of the Parthian Empire, was located in the valley of the Helmund, and was known by the optional
1 Records of the Gupta Dynasty (Trübrier, 1876), p. 37.
“It is in regard to the typical details, however, that the contrast between the pieces of Mauas and Heraüs is most apparent. Mauas has no coins with his own bust among the infinite variety of his mint devices, nor has Azas, who imitates so many of his emblems. But, in the Gondophares group, we meet again with busts and uncovered heads, the hair being simply bound by a fillet, in which arrangement of the head-dress Pakores, with his bnshy curls, follows suit. But the crucial typical test is furnished by the emall figure of victory crowning the horseman on the reverse, which is so special a characteristic of the Parthian die illustration,
“We have frequent examples of Angels or types of victory extending re fillets in the Bactrian series, but these figures constitute as a rule the main device of the reverse, and are not subordinated into a corner, as in the Parthian system. The first appearance of the fillet in direct connexion with the king's head in the Imperial series, occurs on the coins of Arsaces XIV., Orodes (H.C. 54-37), where the crown is borne by an eagle (Lindsay, History of the Parthians, Cork, 1852, pl. iii. fig. 2, pp. 146-170; Trésor de Numismatique, pl. lxviii. fig. 17); hut on the reverses of the copper coinage this duty is already confided to the winged figure of Victory (Lindsay, pl. v. fig. 2, p. 181). Arsaces XV., Phrahates IV. (37 B.C.-4 A.D.), continues the eagles for a time, but progresses into single (Ibid., pl. iii. fig. 60, v. fig. 4, pp. 148, 170; Trésor de Numismatique, pl. lxviii. fig. 18; pl. lxix. fig. 5), and finally into double figures of Victory eager to crown him (Ibid., pl. iii. figs. 61-63), as indicating his successes against Antony and the annexation of the kingdom of Media (Lindsay, p. 46; Rawlinson, The Sixth Monarchy, p. 182).
" Henceforth these winged adjuncts are discontinned, so that, if we are to seek for the prototype of the Heraüs coin amid Imperial Arsacidan models, we are closely limited in point of antiquity, though the possibly deferred adoption may be less susceptible of proof,"
2 The period of Isidore of Charax has been the subject of much controversy. The writer of the notice in Smith's Dictionary contents himself with saying, "He seems to have lived under the early Roman Emperors." C. Müller, the special authority for all Greek geographical questions, sums up his critical examination of the evidence to the point: * Probant scriptorem nostrum Augusti temporibus debere fuisse proximnm." -Geog. Grec. Min. vol. i. p. lxxiv.
3 17. 'Εντεύθεν Ζαραγγιανή, σχοίνοι κα'. Ένθα πολις Πάριν και Κορδκ πόλις. 18. 'Εντεύθεν Σακαστανή Σακών Σκυθών, ή και Παραιτακηνή, σχοίνοι ξη. Ένθα Βαρδα πόλις και Μιν πόλις και Παλακεντί πόλις και Σιγάλ πόλις» ένθα βασίλεια Σακών και πλησίον 'Αλεξάνδρεια πόλις (και πλησίον 'Αλεξανδρόπολις πόλις: Kwuar e E. Isidore of Charax,“ Stathmi Parthici, ed. C. Müller. Paris. pp. 253. lxxxv. and xciii., map No. x. The text goes on to enumerate the stages up to Alexandropolis untpomohıs 'Apaxwolas, and concludes : 'Axpi TOÚTOV ZOT T @ Ildpowy Tikprela. I annex for the sake of comparison Ptolemy'a list of the cities of Drangia, after the century and a half which is roughly estimated as the interval between the two geographers. Sigal and Sakastane seem