The Greeks in Bactria and India c29.2

c29.2

Hermaeus’ Greek legend on his own coins, both silver and copper, which were struck in the Alexandria-Kapisa mint, is always βασιλέως σωτῆρος Ἑρμαίου, ‘Of king Hermaeus, saviour’, and the Kharoshthi legend is the corresponding Maharajasa tradatasa Heramayasa, with the ‘Zeus enthroned’ of Alexandria-Kapisa.¹ The Kadphises coins, which are of inferior style, resembling the debased copies of Hermaeus’ money issued after his death, fall into two classes. The first class² has: obverse, bust of Hermaeus diademed and Greek legend βασιλέως στηρος συ Ἑρμαίου (often corrupted); reverse, Heracles facing with club and lion’s skin, and a Kharoshthi legend signifying ‘Kujula Kadphises, Kushan, yavuga (chief)’. This class has the square omicron but no other square letters. The second class³ has: obverse, bust of Hermaeus diademed, and a Greek legend, usually mutilated, reading ‘Kujula Kadphises, Kushan’; reverse, the same as the first class. This class, beside the square omicron, has the square sigma and phi which one associates with the coins of Gondophares; as both classes must be near in time, it is clear that the period is getting too late for letter forms to mean much chronologically. In addition, there is a third class which belongs here, a strange copper coinage:⁴ obverse, bust of Hermaeus with a Greek legend βασιλέως στηρος συ Ἑρμαίου; reverse, Nike holding wreath and a Kharoshthi legend Maharajasa rajarajasa mahatasa Heramayasa, ‘Of King Hermaeus, King of Kings, the Great’, or ‘Great King of Kings’. This class shows the round omicron, and no square letters at all. It cannot be Hermaeus’ own coinage; he never uses such titles, nor could he, and the Greek legend is identical with that of the first class mentioned above. The round omicron therefore has nothing to do with the round omicron of the earlier coinage of Hermaeus himself, and that means that we are approaching the time when, on the Kushan coinage, the square letter-forms will have vanished from India and the round omicron will have become stereotyped. As, of the coins mentioned above, the first and third classes are connected by the identical Greek legend and the first and second by the identical reverse, all the coins must belong, roughly, to the same period, which can only be the reign of Kujula Kadphises I; his reign cannot have begun till somewhere after A.D. 25,¹ the date at which the Hou-han-shu begins, and probably went down to c. 50 (p. 352), so that these coins are at least some two generations later than the death of Hermaeus.