The Greeks in Bactria and India c10.s3.5

c10.s3.5

Fortunately a starting point was provided years ago, though in a place where historians concerned with the West would hardly look for it. In 1922 Sir George Macdonald threw out, as ‘pure speculation’, a suggestion that Antiochus IV might have been behind Eucratides.¹ He did not follow it up, and still regarded Eucratides as a rebel against Demetrius; but the association of the two names was the first ray of light in the darkness, for, once the idea was mooted, it was easy to see that there was ample evidence to support it and that several facts whose meaning was heretofore obscure would now automatically fall into place. If, however, I were to start by examining that evidence it would mean writing this chapter twice over, and it will be more comfortable for the reader to travel in the reverse direction from that in which I travelled myself: that is, the story will be told in the form into which analysis ultimately brought it, and the evidence given as we go along. Meanwhile I am not concerned to maintain that Antiochus either was or was not a statesman, or anything else about him; it has always been known that he had ideas. All I want to do is to get the outline of certain facts which ought to show the plan on which he was working and which may of themselves modify our conception of his character. It is worth trying; for, right or wrong, he was no small man. I must begin by briefly sketching his story as I see it.