The Greeks in Bactria and India c28.53

c28.53

This makes the first Saca Era c. 155, arising out of events for which definite reasons are given in Chapter v, and the date of the Moga inscription c. 77; as Maues naturally conquered Taxila before he could reach Kapisa, this agrees very well with the deduction already made that Telephus cannot be later than about 70–60. It agrees very well too with the history. The Saca state in Sacastene must have acted as a magnet to the Sacas of the North when they invaded Parthia in 129. The invasion was finally liquidated by the Suren somewhere between 124 (the accession of Mithridates II) and 115, by which date the Parthians were in possession of Merv (p. 281). The Saca invasion of Sind may then have begun any time after about 120; there was a halt after the conquest of the provinces between Abiria on the middle Indus and Surastrene, of unknown duration but long enough to find its way into tradition (p. 320); this was followed by a fresh move up the Indus from Abiria under Maues, which put Taxila into his hands by or shortly before c. 77.¹ Mithridates II rewarded the Suren, and tried to provide against Sacastene being again a danger point, by putting him and his house in charge of Sacastene and the East; if we neglect *names* (he was not yet a ‘king’) and look at *things*, it was one more offshoot of the Seleucid system of a joint-king governing the East. The ultimate result was a second Parthian realm in the East (Indo-Parthian or Pahlava of the numismatists) which for a time under Gondophares may have been more powerful than the Parthia of the Arsacids.