The Early History of India, from 600 B.C. to the Muhammadan Conquest, including the Invasion of Alexander the Great c26.s1.45

c26.s1.45

The movements of the Sakas and allied nomad tribes were closely connected with the development of the Parthian or Persian power under the Arsakidan kings. Mithradates I, a very able monarch (*c.* 171 to 136 b. c.), who was for many years the contemporary of Eukratides, king of Bactria, succeeded in extending his dominions so widely that his power was felt as far as the Indus, and probably even to the east of that river. I see no good reason for doubting the truth of the explicit statement of Orosius that, subsequent to the defeat of the general of Demetrios and the occupation of Babylon, Mithradates I annexed to his dominions the territory of all the nations between the Indus and the Hydaspes, or Jihlam river. The chiefs of Taxila and Mathurā would not have assumed the purely Persian title of satrap, if they had not regarded themselves as subordinates of the Persian or Parthian sovereign; and the close relations between the Parthian monarchy and the Indian borderland at this period are demonstrated by the appearance of a long line of princes of Parthian origin, who now enter on the scene.¹