The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c31.85

v1.c31.85

Another apocryphal work, the *Evangelium Ioannis de obitu Mariae* gives the name Labdanes to the sister's son of a king to whom St Thomas went. So far as the form is concerned, *Labdanes* may well be a corruption of *Abdagases* in the manuscripts; but the identification of the two names is far from certain. The name of the king is not mentioned: he may have been either Gondopharnes or Mazdai, whom St Thomas also visited, and under whom he suffered martyrdom; and moreover the Abdagases of the coin-legends is the brother's son, not the sister's son, of Gondopharnes¹.