The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c26.280

v1.c26.280

At this point it becomes necessary to notice a group of four or five kings, whose existence is vouched for solely by the money which they struck, but who must have been to some extent contemporary with the two who have just been discussed. Appreciation of the evidence will be facilitated by a further glance at the silver coinage of Demetrius who, by the way, does not seem to have struck any gold. It will be observed (Pl. III, 3) that he is the first of the Bactrian kings to be represented with his shoulders draped; and from his time onwards that feature is virtually universal. But he is also the last to be shown with one end of the royal diadem flying out behind, and the other hanging straight down his back, a method of arrangement that had persisted steadily in Bactria since the reign of Antiochus I (see Pl. II, 9–14, and Pl. III, 1 and 2). Again, on the great majority of the surviving specimens of his coinage, his bust on the obverse is enclosed within the circle of plain dots which had hitherto been customary. On the other hand, in a few cases, the circle of plain dots is replaced by the so-called bead-and-reel border, which is familiar from its use on the issues of Antiochus the Great and later Seleucid kings, and which is invariably found on the tetradrachms of Eucratides and his son and successor Heliocles (Pl. IV, 4–9). These differences, coupled with other and less obvious *nuances* of style, will supply valuable guidance in determining the period to which one ought to assign the pieces that have now to be described. It has already been mentioned (*supra*, p. 443) that after the reign of Euthydemus, the dies are always adjusted ↑ ↑.