The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c15.149

v1.c15.149

The river Indus also appears at first sight to form a natural boundary between India and Irān; but in this case it would be more correct historically to say that the country through which it flows has more frequently been the cause of contention between India and Irān. The very name India, 'the country of the Indus,' was first known to the West as that of a province of the Persian empire. In Herodotus, the Greek historian of the wars between the Persian empire and Greece in the early part of the fifth century B.C., it bears its original meaning. At a later date, Greek and Roman writers, as so often happens in geographical nomenclature, transferred the name of the best known province to the whole country and set an example which has since been followed universally.