The Greeks in Bactria and India c10.s2.79

c10.s2.79

Demetrius himself was responsible for the conquest of Sind. A scholion to the grammarian Patañjali¹ (p. 146) mentions a town Dattāmitrī among the Sauvīras and says that it was founded by Dattāmitra, who is named in the Mahābhārata as king of the Yavanas and Sauvīras and is undoubtedly Demetrius; and the existence of this Demetrias in Sind is confirmed by an inscription.² It was certainly not the Arachosian Demetrias between Seistan and Ghazni (see App. 9), for the Sauvīra-Sindhus had nothing to do with Arachosia; at this time they were on the lower Indus and occupied its Delta (p. 171). This Demetrias is not likely to have been a completely new city. Alexander had begun to build great docks at Patala and must have left a colony there; what Demetrius found there is unknown, but Patala was the natural port and centre, and undoubtedly Demetrias was Patala re-founded and renamed;³ Demetrius may have had in mind the creation of a port on the Indus which should correspond to that of Seleuceia on the Tigris. Demetrius then followed Alexander’s track down the Indus to the sea. Alexander had gone by water; Darius I before him had sent a fleet down the Indus; Demetrius too must have followed the easy and natural course of going by water, which would mean that on reaching the sea there was a fleet at his disposal. The trident on one of his coins⁴ must imply naval power, but it is a Bactrian coin and not likely to refer to a fleet on the Indus; probably it is connected with the symbolism of Antimachus’ coins (p. 90) and refers to the squadron which every Bactrian king must have maintained on the Oxus as part of the country’s system of defence.