The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c31.33

v1.c31.33

In India the 'King of Kings' ruled with the aid of satraps and military governors. The first three Çaka suzerains who succeeded to the dominions of the Yavanas in the N.W. Frontier Province and the Punjab were Maues, Azes I, and Azilises. Their numerous coinages are, almost without exception, copied from those of their Yavana predecessors: and it is therefore probable that the coins represent only those districts of the Çaka realm which were formerly held by the Yavanas². The great variety of the types thus imitated indicates the wide extent of these territories; and the astonishing difference of style shown by coins struck in the same reign proves that the art of different regions varied enormously at the same period. The best coins belong no doubt to Gandhāra (Pushkalāvatī and Takshaçilā). Inferior workmanship is a sign of remoteness from this region rather than of a late date, as the numismatists have commonly assumed. It was in Gandhāra that the Graeco-Buddhist school of art, the outcome of a fusion of Greek and Indian ideals and methods, grew up and flourished, but it was not until the end of the first century A.D. that this school reached its highest state as seen in the religious sculptures of the Kushāṇas. Its beginnings are no doubt to be traced in the coins of an earlier date, and such beginnings were naturally progressive. The finest coins of Maues, for instance, are excelled by those of Azilises two reigns later¹. The early date, viz. c. 120 B.C., which is usually assigned to Maues entirely on grounds of style and on the gratuitous assumption that art was retrogressive from the time of the Yavanas onwards, cannot therefore be maintained. It is far more probable that he invaded India after the end of the reign of Mithradates II (123–88 B.C.) when Parthia ceased to exercise any real control over Seistān and Kandahār.