The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c26.182

v1.c26.182

As to the disposal of the dead, the absence of funeral display and of imposing monuments seemed strange to the Greeks. The virtues of the dead—so they understood the Indians to say—were sufficient monument and the songs which were sung over them⁵. When the Greeks tell us that the dead were exposed to vultures, we can only understand it of certain peoples near the frontier who had been influenced by the customs of Irān¹.