The Ancient Geography of India. I. The Buddhist Period, including the Campaigns of Alexander, and the Travels of Hwen-Thsang c5.s1.t1.8

c5.s1.t1.8

The position of the city founded by Alexander at the foot of the Indian Caucasus has long engaged the attention of scholars; but the want of a good map of the Kabul valley has been a serious obstacle to their success, which was rendered almost insurmountable by their injudicious alterations of the only ancient texts that preserved the distinctive name of the Caucasian Alexandria. Thus Stephanus† describes it as being ἐν τῇ ᾿Οπιανῇ κατὰ τὴν ᾿Ινδικήν, “in Opiane, near India,” for which Salmasius proposed to read ᾿Απιανῇ. Again, Pliny‡ describes it as Alexandriam Opianes, which in the Leipsic and other editions is altered to *Alexandri oppidum*. I believe, also, that the same distinctive name may be restored to a corrupt passage of Pliny, where he is speaking of this very part of the country. His words, as given by the Leipsic editor, and as quoted by Cellarius,[*] are "Cartana oppidum sub Caucaso, quod postea Tetragonis dictum. Hæc regio est ex adverso. Bactrianorum deinde cujus oppidum Alexandria, a conditore dictum." Both of the translators whose works I possess, namely Philemon Holland, A.D. 1601, and W. T. Riley, A.D. 1855, agree in reading *ex adverso Bactrianorum*. This makes sense of the words as they stand, but it makes nonsense of the passage, as it refers the city of Alexandria to Bactria, a district which Pliny had fully described in a previous chapter. He is speaking of the country at the foot of the Caucasus or Paropamisus; and as he had already described the Bactrians as being "aversa montis Paropamisi," he now uses almost the same terms to describe the position of the district in which Cartana was situated; I would, therefore, propose to read "hæc regio est ex adverso Bactriæ;" and as *cujus* cannot possibly refer to the Bactrians, I would begin the next sentence by changing the latter half of *Bactrianorum* in the text to *Opiorum*; the passage would then stand thus, "Opiorum (regio) deinde, cujus oppidum Alexandria a conditore dictum,"—"Next the Opii, whose city, Alexandria, was named after its founder." But whether this emendation be accepted or not, it is quite clear from the other two passages, above quoted, that the city founded by Alexander at the foot of the Indian Caucasus was also named Opiane. This fact being established, I will now proceed to show that the position of Alexandria Opiane agrees as nearly as possible with the site of the present Opiân, near Charikâr.