The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c26.3

v1.c26.3

The Greek peoples at the time when the Homeric poems were composed had probably never heard of India, and knew nothing of the Āryan cousins separated from them by the great Semitic kingdoms of Assyria and Babylonia. At most they knew that peoples of dark complexion dwelt, some towards the setting, and some towards the rising, sun¹. The Homeric Greeks used ivory, and were no doubt aware that it was the tusk of an animal—the Phoenician traders indeed will have called it, as the Hebrews did, *shēn*, 'tooth'—but the ivory was more probably African ivory brought from Egypt than Indian².