Political History of Ancient India, from the Accession of Parikshit to the Extinction of the Gupta Dynasty c13.s1: Section I. The Advance of Persia to the Indus
Political History of Ancient India, from the Accession of Parikshit to the Extinction of the Gupta Dynasty c13.s1
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Section I. The Advance of Persia to the Indus
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While the kingdoms and republics of the Indian interior were gradually being merged in the Magadhan Empire, those of North-West India (including modern Western Pākistān) were passing through vicissitudes of a different kind. In the first half of the sixth century B.C., the *Uttarāpatha* (northern region) beyond the *Madhyadeśa* (Mid-India, roughly the Ganges-Jumna Doāb, Oudh and some adjoining tracts), like the rest of India, was parcelled out into a number of small states the most important of which were Kamboja, Gandhāra and Madra. No sovereign arose in this part of India capable of welding together the warring communities, as Ugrasena-Mahāpadma had done in the East. The whole region was at once wealthy and disunited, and formed the natural prey of the strong Achaemenian monarchy which grew up in Persia (Irān).
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Kurush or Cyrus (558-530 B.C.¹) the founder of the Persian Empire, is said to have led an expedition against India through Gedrosia, but had to abandon the enterprise, escaping with seven men only.² But he was more successful in the Kābul valley. We learn from Pliny that he destroyed the famous city of Kāpiśī, at or near the confluence of the Ghorband and the Panjshir. Arrian informs us³ that "the district west of the river Indus as far as the river Cophen (Kābul) is inhabited by the Astacenians (Āshṭakas)¹ and the Assacenian (Aśvakas), *Indian* tribes. These were in ancient times subject to the Assyrians, afterwards to the Medes, and finally they submitted to the Persians, and paid tribute to Cyrus, the son of Cambyses, as ruler of their land." Strabo tells us that on one occasion the Persians summoned the Hydraces (the Kshudrakas) from India (*i.e.*, the Pañjāb) to attend them as mercenaries.
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¹ 550-529 B. C. according to *A Survey of Persian Art*, p. 64.
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² H. and F., *Strabo*, III, p. 74.
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³ Chinnock, *Arrian's Anabasis*, p. 399.
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¹ Patañjali (IV. 2. 2) refers to "*Ashṭakaṁ nāma dhanva;*" (cf. *Hashtnagar, and Aṭhakanagara*, Lüders, 390).
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In the Behistun or Bahistān inscription of Dārayavaush or **Darius I** (*c.* 522-486 B.C.) the third sovereign of the Achaemenian dynasty, the people of Gandhāra (Gadāra) appear among the subject peoples of the Persian Empire. But no mention is there made of the Hidus (Hindus, people of Sindhu or the Indus Valley) who are explicitly referred to in the Hamadan Inscription, and are included with the Gandhārians in the lists of subject peoples given by the inscriptions on the terrace at Persepolis, and around the tomb of Darius at Naqsh-i- Rustum.² From this it has been inferred that the "Indians" (Hidus) were conquered at some date between 519 B.C. (the probable date of the Behistun or Bahistān inscription),³ and 513 B.C.⁴ The preliminaries to this conquest are described by Herodotus:⁵ "He (Darius, being desirous to know in what part the Indus, which is the second river that produces crocodiles, discharges itself into the sea, sent in ships both others on whom he could rely to make a true report and also Scylax of Caryanda. They accordingly setting out from the city of Caspatyrus¹ and the country of Paktyike (Pakthas ?)² sailed down the river towards the east and sunrise to the sea; then sailing on the sea westwards, they arrived in the thirtieth month at that place where the king of Egypt despatched the Phoenicians, to sail round Libya. After these persons had sailed round, Darius subdued the Indians and frequented the Sea."
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² *Ancient Persian Lexicon and the Texts of the Achaemenidan Inscriptions* by H. C. Tolman; Rapson, *Ancient India*; Herzfeld, *MASI*, 34, pp. 1 ff.
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³ In the opinion of Jackson (*Camb. Hist. India*, I, 334) the Bahistān Rock Inscription is presumably to be assigned to a period between 520 and 518 B.C. with the exception of the fifth column, which was added later. Rapson regarded 516 B.C. as the probable date of the famous epigraph while Herzfeld prefers the date 519 B.C. (*MASI*, No. 34, p. 2).
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⁴ Olmstead, *History of the Persian Empire*, 145. Herzfeld is, however, of the opinion that reference to the 'Thatagush' in early Persian epigraphs shows that (part of) the Pañjāb, like Gandhāra, was Persian from the days of Cyrus the Great.
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⁵ McCrindle, *Ancient India as described in Classical Literature*, pp 4-5.
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¹ *Camb. Hist. Ind.*, I. 336. The city was probably situated in ancient Gandhāra; *Herod.* IV. 44.
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² *Camb. Ibid*, 82, 339. Paktyike is apparently the ancient name of the modern Pathan country on the north-west borderland of the sub-continent of India.
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Herodotus tells us that "India" constituted the twentieth and the most populous satrapy of the Persian Empire, and that it paid a tribute proportionately larger than all the rest,—360 talents of gold dust, equivalent to £1,290,000 of the pre-war period. There is no reason to believe that all this gold came from Bactria or Siberia. Gold deposits are not unknown in several tracts of the North-West Frontier, and quantities of gold are recovered from the alluvium of rivers. A small quantity of the precious metal used to be imported by Bhotiya traders from the Tibetan Hills.³ Gandhāra was included in the seventh satrapy. The details regarding "India" left by Herodotus leave no room for doubt that it embraced the Indus Valley and was bounded on the east by the desert of Rājaputāna. "That part of India towards the rising sun is all sand; for of the people with whom we are acquainted, the Indians live the furthest towards the east and the sunrise, of all the inhabitants of Asia, for the Indians' country towards the east is a desert by reason of the sands." Curtius refers to extensive deserts beyond the Beas.
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³ Crooke, *The North-Western Provinces of India*, 1897, p. 10; *Amrita Bazar Patrika*, 19-7-39, p. 6; *cf.* Watters, *Yuan Chwang*, I. 225, 239.
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The organisation of the empire into Satrapies served as a model to several succeeding dynasties, and was given a wider extension in India by the Śakas and the Kushāns in the centuries immediately preceding and succeeding the Christian era. The *Deśa-goptṛi* of the Gupta Age was the lineal successor of the Satrap (*Kshatra-pāvan*) of earlier epochs.
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The Persian conquerors did much to promote geographical exploration and commercial activity. At the same time they took from the country not only an enormous amount of gold and other commodities such as ivory and wood, but denuded it of a great portion of its man-power. Military service was exacted from several tribes. Contact between the East and the West became more intimate with important results in the domain of culture. If the Achaemenians brought the Indian bowmen and lancers to Hellenic soil, they also showed the way of conquest and cultural penetration to the peoples of Greece and Macedon.
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Khshayārshā or Xerxes (486-465 B.C.), the son and successor of Darius I, maintained his hold on the Indian provinces. In the great army which he led against Hellas both Gandhāra and "India" were represented. The Gandhārians are described by Herodotus as bearing bows of reed and short spears, and the "Indians" as being clad in cotton garments and bearing cane bows with arrows tipped with iron. One of the newly discovered stone-tablets at Persepolis¹ records that Xerxes "by Ahuramazda's will" sapped the foundations of certain temples of the *Daivas* and ordained that "the *Daivas* shall not be worshipped".
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¹ *The Illustrated London News*, Feb. 22, 1936, p. 328. Sen, *Old Persian Inscriptions*, 152.
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Where the *Daivas* had been worshipped, the king worshipped Ahuramazda together with *Ṛtam* (divine world order). ‘India’ may have been among the lands which witnessed the outcome of the religious zeal of the Persian king.
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The Persian Empire rapidly declined after the death of Xerxes. But if Ktesias who resided at the Court of Artaxerxes II, Mnemon 405-358 B. C., is to be believed, the Great King used to receive costly presents from India even in the fourth century B. C.¹ The South Tomb Inscription at Persepolis,² usually assigned to Artaxerxes II, continues to mention the Sattagydians, the Gandharians and the Hi(n)dus side by side with the Persians, the Medians, the Susians and others apparently as subjects of the Achaemenian King.
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¹ *Ind. Ant.*, Vol. X (1881), pp. 304-310.
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² S. Sen, *Old Persian Inscriptions*, 172f.
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Among interesting relics of Persian dominion in India mention is sometimes made of a Taxila inscription in Aramaic characters of the fourth or fifth century B.C.³ But Herzfeld points out⁴ that the form *Priyadarśana* occurs in the record which should be referred to the reign of Aśoka, and not to the period of Persian rule. To the Persians is also attributed the introduction of the *Kharoshṭhī* alphabet, the “Persepolitan capital” and words like “*dipi*” (rescript) and “*nipishṭa*” (“written”) occurring in the inscriptions of Aśoka. Persian influence has also been traced in the preamble of the Aśokan edicts.
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³ *JRAS.*, 1915, I, pp. 340-347.
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⁴ *Ep. Ind.*, XIX. 253.