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EarlyIndoScythianCoin.jpg|thumb|300px|Early anepigraphic coinage of the Indo-Scythians (c. 110 - 100 BCE).
Obv: Horse walking right with her head turned back.
Rev: Goddess Nike walking right. Control mark, possibly for Khandahar, Afghanistan.]]
The Indo-Scythians are a branch of the Indo-European Sakas (Scythians), who migrated from southern Siberia into Bactria, Sogdiana, Arachosia, Gandhara, Kashmir, Punjab, and finally into India from the middle of the 2nd century BCE to the 1st century BCE.
Origins
The ancestors of the Indo-Scythians are thought to be Sakas (Scythian) tribes, originally settled in southern Siberia, in the Ili river area.
Around 175 BCE, the Yuezhi tribes (probable related to the Tocharians) who lived in modern day Gansu, were defeated by the Xiongnu (Huns) tribes, and had to migrate towards the West into the Ili river area. There, they displaced the Sakas, who had to migrate south into Ferghana and Sogdiana. According to the Chinese historical chronicles (who call the Sakas, "Sai" 塞):
"The Yuezhi attacked the king of the Sai who moved a considerable distance to the south and the Yuezhi then occupied his lands" (Han Shu 61 4B).
Sometime after 155 BCE, the Yuezhi were again defeated by an alliance of the Wusun and the Xiongnu, and were forced to move south, again displacing the Scythians, who migrated south towards Bactria, and south-west towards Parthia and Afghanistan.
The Sakas seem to have entered the territory of the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom around 145 BCE, where they burnt to the ground the Greek city of Alexandria on the Oxus. The Yuezhi remained in Sogdiana on the northern bank of the Oxus, but they became suzerains of the Sakas in Bactrian territory, as described by the Chinese ambassador Zhang Qian who visited the region around 126 BCE.
In Parthia, between 138-124 BCE, the Sakas tribes of the Massagetae and Sacaraucae came into conflict with the Parthian Empire, winning several battles, and killing successively king Phraates II and king Artabanus I.
The Parthian king Mithridates II finally retook control of Central Asia, first by defeating the Yuezhi in Sogdiana in 115 BCE, and then defeating the Scythians in Parthia and Seistan around 100 BCE.
After their defeat, the Yuezhi tribes migrated into Bactria, which they were to control for several centuries, and from which they later conquered northern India to found the Kushan Empire. The area of Bactria they settled came to be known as Tokharistan, since the Yuezhi were called Tocharians by the Greeks.
The Sakas settled in areas of southern Afghanistan, still called after them Sakastan. From there, they progressively expanded into the Indian subcontinent, where they established various kingdoms, and where they are known as "Indo-Scythians".
Indo-Scythian kingdoms
Maues.jpg|thumb|300px|Silver tetradrachm of the Indo-Scythian King Maues (85-60 BCE).
Obv: Zeus standing with a sceptre. Greek legend: BASILEOS BASILEON MEGALOU MAUOU "of the Great King of Kings Maues".
Rev: Nike standing, holding a wreath. Kharoshthi legend. Taxila mint.]]
Abiria to Surastrene
The first Indo-Scythian kingdom in the Indian subcontinent occupied the southern part of Pakistan (which they accessed from southern Afghanistan), in the areas from Abiria (Sindh) to Surastrene (Gujarat), from around 110 to 80 BCE. They progressively further moved north into Indo-Greek territory until the conquests of Maues, circa 80 BCE.The Indo-Scythians ultimately established a kingdom in the northwest, based in Taxila, with two Great Satraps, one in Mathura in the east, and one in Surastrene (Gujarat) in the southwest.
Gandhara and Punjab
The presence of the Scythians in north-western India during the 1st century BCE was contemporary with that of the Indo-Greek Kingdoms there, and it seems they initially recognized the power of the local Greek rulers.Maues first conquered Gandhara and Taxila around 80 BCE, but his kingdom disintegrated after his death. In the east, the Indian king Vikrama retook Ujjain from the Indo-Scythians, celebrating his victory by the creation of the Vikrama Era (starting 58 BCE). Indo-Greek kings again ruled after Maues, and prospered, as indicated by the profusion of coins from kings Apollodotus II and Hippostratos. Not until Azes I, in 55 BCE, did the Indo-Scythians take final control of northwestern India, with his victory over Hippostratos.
The coins of the Indo-Scythians in northwestern India, probably designed by Indo-Greek celators (their coins bear Greek monograms, and still kept their Greek names and denominations), displayed Greek legends and Greek divinities such as Zeus or Nike in a fine style.
Azes II is connected to the Bimaran casket, one of the earliest representations of the Buddha. The casket, probably Greek work, was used for the dedication of a stupa in Bamiran, near Jalalabad in Afghanistan, and placed inside the stupa with several coins of Azes II. This event may have happened during the reign of Azes II (30-10 BCE), or slightly later. The Indo-Scythians are otherwise connected with Buddhism (see Mathura lion capital), and it is indeed possible they would have commendited the work.
Mathura
Rujavula.jpg|thumb|300px|Coin of Rajuvula (circa 10 CE), AE, Mathura.Obv: Bust of king Rajuvula, with Greek legend.
Rev: Pallas standing right (crude). Kharoshthi legend.]] In central India, the Indo-Scythians conquered the area of Mathura over Indian kings around 60 BCE. Some of their satraps were Hagamasha and Hagana, who were in turn followed by the Saca Great Satrap Rajuvula.
The Mathura lion capital, an Indo-Scythian sandstone capital in crude style, from Mathura in Central India, and dated to the 1st century CE, describes in kharoshthi the gift of a stupa with a relic of the Buddha, by Queen Nadasi Kasa, the wife of the Indo-Scythian ruler of Mathura, Rajuvula. The capital also mentions the genealogy of several Indo-Scythian satraps of Mathura.
Rajuvula apparently eliminated the last of the Indo-Greek kings Strato II around 10 CE, and took his capital city, Sagala.
The coinage of the period, such as that of Rajuvula, tends to become very crude and barbarized in style. It is also very much debased, the silver content becoming lower and lower, in exchange for a higher proportion of bronze, an alloying technique (billon) suggesting less than wealthy finances.
Pataliputra
The text of the Yuga Purana describes an invasion of Pataliputra by the Scythians sometimes during the 1st century BCE, after seven greats kings had ruled in succession in Saketa following the retreat of the Indo-Greeks from Eastern India (circa 170 BCE). The Yuga Purana explains that the king of the Sakas killed one fourth of the population, before he was himself slain by the Kalinga king Shata and a group of Sabalas (Savaras) A gap in Puranic history.Kushan and Indo-Parthian conquests
After the death of Azes II, the rule of the Indo-Scythians in northwestern India finally crumbled with the conquest of the Kushans, one of the five tribes of the Yuezhi who had lived in Bactria for more than a century, and were now expanding into India to create a Kushan Empire. Soon after, the Parthians invaded from the west. Their leader Gondophares temporarily displaced the Kushans and founded the Indo-Parthian Kingdom that was to last towards the middle of the 1st century CE.The Kushans ultimately regained northwestern India from around 75 CE, and the area of Mathura from around 100 CE, where they were to prosper for several centuries.
Western Kshatrapas legacy
The Indo-Scythians continued to hold the area of Seistan until the reign of Bahram II (276-293 CE), and held several areas of India well into the 1st millennium: Kathiawar and Gujarat were under their rule until the 5th century under the designation of Western Kshatrapas, until they were eventually conquered by the Gupta emperor Chandragupta II (also called Vikramaditya).The Indo-Scythians and Buddhism
The Indo-Scythians seem to have been followers of Buddhism, and many of their practices apparently continued those of the Indo-Greeks.
Mathura lion capital
The Mathura lion capital, which associates many the Indo-Scythian rulers from Maues to Rajuvula, mentions a dedication of a relic of the Buddha in a stupa. It also bears centrally the Buddhist symbol of the triratana, and is also filled with mentions of the bhagavat Buddha Sakyamuni, and characteristically Buddhist phrases such as:
- "sarvabudhana puya dhamasa puya saghasa puya"
- "Revere all the Buddhas, revere the dharma, revere the sangha"
- (Mathura lion capital, inscription O1/O2)
Coinage
Buddhist symbolism is present throughout Indo-Scythian coinage. In particular, they adopted the Indo-Greek practice since Menander I of showing divinities forming the vitarka mudra with their right hand (as for the mudra-forming Zeus on the coins of Maues or Azes II), or the presence of the Buddhist lion on the coins of the same two kings, or the triratana symbol on the coins of Zeionises.Gandhara sculpture
Indo-Scythians soldiers in military attire are sometimes represented in Buddhist friezes in the art of Gandhara (particularly in Buner reliefs). They are depicted in ample tunics with trousers, with a pointed hood and heavy straight sword as a weapon. With the right hand, some of them are forming the Corna, thought to be a symbol of good luck. In Gandhara, such friezes were used as decorations on the piedestals of Buddhist stupas. They are contemporary with other friezes representing people in purely Greek attire, hinting at an intermixing of Indo-Scythians (holding military power) and Indo-Greeks (confined, under Indo-Scythian rule, to civilian life).Another relief is known where the same type of soldiers are playing musical instruments.
Indo-Scythians in Ancient Indian Literature
- Main article: Sakas
"Degraded Kshatriyas" from the northwest
The Manusmriti, written about 200 CE, groups the Shakas with the Yavanas, Kambojas, Paradas, Pahlavas, Kiratas and the Daradas etc..., and addresses them all as degraded warriors, or Kshatriyas (X/43-44). Anushasanaparava of the Mahabharata also views the Shakas, Kambojas, Yavanas etc. in the same light. Patanjali in his Mahabhasya regards the Shakas and Yavanas as pure Shudras (II.4.10).The Vartika of the Katyayana informs us that the kings of the Shakas and the Yavanas, like those of the Kambojas, may also be addressed by their respective tribal names.
The Mahabharata also associates the Shakas with the Yavanas, Gandharas, Kambojas, Pahlavas, Tusharas, Sabaras, Barbaras etc and addresses them all as the Barbaric tribes of Uttarapatha. In another verse, the epic groups the Shakas Kambojas and Khashas and addresses them as the tribes from Udichya i.e north division (5/169/20). Also, the Kishkindha Kanda of the Ramayana locates the Shakas, Kambojas, Yavanas and Paradas in the extreme north-west beyond the Himavat (i.e. Hindukush) (43/12).
The Udyogaparava of the Mahabharata (5/19/21-23) tells us that the composite army of the Kambojas, Yavanas and Shakas had participated in the Mahabharata war under the supreme command of Sudakshina Kamboja. The epic repeatedly applauds this composite army as being very fierce and wrathful.
Invasion of India (180 BCE onward)
The Vanaparava of the Mahabharata contains verses in the form of prophecy that the kings of the Shakas, Yavanas, Kambojas, Bahlikas and Abhiras, etc. shall rule unrighteously in Kaliyuga (MBH 3/188/34-36).This reference apparently alludes to the precarious political scenario following the collapse of Mauryan and Sunga dynasties in northern India and its occupation by foreign hordes of the Shakas, Yavanas, Kambojas and Pahlavas.
Extinction in the 5th century CE
The Brihat-Katha-Manjari of the Kshmendra (10/1/285-86) informs us that around 400 CE the Gupta king Vikramaditya (Chandragupta II) had unburdened the sacred earth of the Barbarians like the Shakas, Mlecchas, Kambojas, Yavanas, Tusharas, Parasikas, Hunas, etc. by annihilating these sinners completely.The 10th century CE Kavyamimamsa of Chander Shekhar (Ch 17) still lists the Shakas, Tusharas, Vokanas, Hunas, Kambojas, Bahlikas, Pahlavas, Tangana, Turukshas, etc. together and states them as the tribes located in the Uttarapatha division.
Notes
Main Indo-Scythian rulers
Northwestern India:
- Maues, c. 90-60 BCE Coin
- Vonones, c. 75-65 BCE Coin
- Spalahores, c. 75-65 BCE Coin
- Spalirises, c. 60-57 BCE Coin
- Azes I, c. 57-35 BCE Coin
- Azilises, c. 57-35 BCE Coin
- Azes II, c. 35-12 BCE Coin
- Zeionises, c.10 BCE-10 CE
- Kharahostes, c.10 BCE- 10 CE
- Hajatria
- Liaka Kusuluka, satrap of Chuksa
- Kusulaka Patika, satrap of Chuksa and son of Liaka Kusulaka
Bajaur area (Apracharaja rulers):
- Vijayamitra (12 BCE - 15 CE)
- Itravasu (c.20 CE)
- Aspavarma (15 - 45 CE)
Mathura area:
Minor local rulers:
See also
External links
Iranian peoples | History of India | History of Pakistan
"Indo-Scythians"