they both claimed kindred with that tribe, or at some time held command in their national contingent-and Plato may, with equal possibility, have introduced the device, in the first instance, as have copied the more abundant obverses of similar character from the coins of Eucratides. On the other hand, the identity of the helmet may indicate an absolute borrowing of a ready prepared device. The singular and eccentric combination of Bactrian Mint dies has from the first constituted a difficulty and a danger to modern interpreters. I have for long past looked suspiciously upon the too facile adaptations of otherwise conscientious mint masters, leading them to utilize, for reasons of their own, the available die-devices in stock for purposes foreign to the original intent under which they were executed. However, in the present instance, the imperfect preservation of the single coin of Plato available does not permit of our pronouncing with any certainty upon the identity of the features with those of the profile of Eucratides. To revert to our leading subject. In addition to the value of the data quoted above as fixing definitively, though within fairly anticipated limits, the epochs of three prominent Bactrian kings, their conventional use of the system of abbreviated definitions points, directly, to the assimilation of local customs, to which the Greeks so readily lent themselves, in adopting the method of reckoning by the Indian Loka Kála, which simplified the expression of dates, even as we do now, in the civilized year of our Lord, when we write 76 for 1876. The extension of the Seleucidan era eastwards, and its amalgamation of Indian methods of definition within its own mechanism, leads further to the consideration of how long this exotic era maintained its ground in Upper India, and how much influence it exerted upon the chronological records of succeeding dynasties. I have always been under the impression that this influence was more wide-spread and abiding than my fellow-antiquaries have been ready to admit,1 but Journal Royal Asiatic Society, Vol. XII. p. 41; Journal Asiatic Society Bengal, 1855, p. 565, and 1872, p. 175; Prinsep's Essays, vol. ii. p. 86; Journal Asiatique, 1863, p. 388. I am now prepared to carry my inferences into broader channels, and to suggest that the Indo-Scythian "Kanishka" group of kings continued to use the Seleucidan era, even as they retained the minor sub-divisions of the Greek months, which formed an essential part of its system: and under this view to propose that we should treat the entire circle of dates of the "Hushka, Jushka, and Kanishka" family, mentioned in the Rája Taranginí, which their inscriptions expand from ix. to xcviii., as pertaining to the fourth century of the Seleucidan era, an arrangement which will bring them into concert with our Christian reckoning from 2 B.c. to 87 A.D. A scheme which would, moreover, provide for their full possession of power up to the crucial "Saka" date of 78-79 A.D., and allow for the subsequent continuance of a considerable breadth of sway outside the limited geographical range of Indian cognizance. There are further considerations which add weight to the conclusion that the Kanerki Scythians adopted, for public purposes, the Seleucidan era; they may be supposed, like the Parthians and other Nomads, to have achieved but scant culture till conquest made them masters of civilized sections of the earth. In the present instance, these new invaders are seen to have ignored or rejected the Semitic-Bactrian writing employed by the Kadphises horde in parallel concert with the traditional monumental Greek, and to have relied exclusively on the Greek language in their official records till the later domestication of some of the members of the family, at Mathurá, led to an exceptional use of the Devanagarí alphabet, in subordination to the dominant Greek, on the coins of Vasudeva. In no case do we find them recognizing the Semitic type of character, though the inscriptions quoted 1 Prof. Wilson's Plates, in his Ariana Antiqua, arranged 35 years ago, and altogether independently of the present argument, will suffice to place this contrast before the reader. The Kadphises group extend from figs. 5 to 21 of plate x. All these coins are bilingual, Greek and Semitic-Bactrian. The Kanerki series commence with No. 15, plate xi., having nothing but Greek legends, either on the obverse or on the reverse, and follow on continuously through plates xii. xiii. and xiv. down to fig. 11. After that, the Greek characters become more or less chaotic, till we reach No. 19. below will show how largely that alphabet had spread in some portions of their dominion. But beyond this, their adherence, or perhaps that of their successors, to Greek, continues mechanically till its characters merge into utter incoherence on the later mintages. All of these indications lead to the inference that, as far as the Court influences were concerned, the tendency to rely upon Greek speech would have carried with it what remained in situ of the manners and customs of their Western instructors.2 There are two groups or varieties of Indo-Scythian Inscriptions of the Kanishka family. The one in the Indian proper or Lát alphabet, all of which are located at Mathurá. The published Mathurá inscriptions of this group (excluding the two quotations placed within brackets) number 20 in all; as a rule they are merely records of votive offerings on the part of "pious founders," and contain only casual references to the ruling powers. Twelve of these make no mention of any monarch, though they are clearly contemporaneous with the other dedicatory inscriptions. Throughout the whole 1 Ariana Antiqua, pl. xiv. Nos. 12, 13, 14, 16, 17. The circumstances bearing upon the battle of Karór (or) are of so much importance in the history of this epoch, that I reproduce Albírúní's account of that event: "On emploie ordinairement les ères de Sri-Harcha, de Vikramáditya, de Şaka, de Ballaba, et des Gouptas. L'ère de Vikramáditya est employée dans les provinces méridionales et occidentales de l'Inde. L'ère de Şaka, nommée par les Indiens ‘Şaka-kála,' est postérieure à celle de Vikramaditya de 135 ans. Şaka est le nom d'un prince qui a régné sur les contrées situées entre l'Indus et la mer. Sa résidence était placée au centre de l'empire, dans la contrée nommée Aryavartha. Les Indiens le font naître dans une classe autre que celle des Sakya; quelques-uns prétendent qu'il était Soudra et originaire de la ville de Mansoura; il y en a même qui disent qu'il n'était pas de race indienne, et qu'il tirait son origine des régions occidentales. Les peuples eurent beaucoup à souffrir de son despotisme, jusqu'à ce qu'il leur vînt du secours de l'Orient. Vikramaditya marcha contre lui, mit son armée en déroute, et le tua sur le territoire de Korour, situé entre Moultan et le château de Louny. Cette époque devint célèbre, à cause de la joie que les peuples ressentirent de la mort de Şaka, et on la choisit pour ère principalement chez les astronomes."-Reinaud's translation. General Cunningham has attempted to identify the site of Karór with a position "50 miles S.E. of Multan and 20 miles N.E. of Bahawalpúr," making the "castle of Loni" into "Ludhan, an ancient town situated near the old bed of the Sutlej river, 44 miles E.N.E. of Kahror and 70 miles E.S.E. of Multán."-Ancient Geography of India (Trübner, 1871), p. 241. These assignments, are, however, seriously shaken by the fact that Albírúní himself invariably places these two sites far north of Multán, i.e. according to his latitudes and longitudes, Multán is 91°-29° 30′ N., while Kadór, as he writes it, is 92°—31° N., and Loni (variant Lot) is 32° N.-Sprenger's Maps, No. 12, etc. series of twenty records the dates are confined to numbers below one hundred: they approach and nearly touch the end of a given century, in the 90 and 98; but do not reach or surpass the crucial hundred discarded in the local cycle. The two inscriptions, Nos. 22, 23, from the same locality, dated, severally, Samvat 135 with the Indian month of Paushya, and Samvat 281, clearly belong to a different age, and vary from their associates in dedicatory phraseology, forms of letters, and many minor characteristics, which General Cunningham readily discriminated.1 Hemanta, S. 39. At Mathura. HUVISHKA. Maharaja DEVAPUTRA Huvishka. Maharaja RAJATIRÁJA DEVAPUTRA Huvishka. Grishma, S. 47.3 Mahárája Huvishka. Hemanta, S. 48. VASUDEVA. Mahárája Rájátirája DEVAPUTRA Vúsu(deva). Varsha, S. 44. Mahárája Rájatirája, SнáнI, Vasudeva. Hemanta, S. 87. 1 Arch. Rep. vol. iii. p. 38. 2 These two dates are quoted from Gen. Cunningham's letter to the Athenæum of 29 April, 1876, as having been lately discovered by Mr. Growse, B.C.S. 3 The 47th year of the Monastery of Huvishka. 4 I was at first disposed to infer that the use of the Indian months in their full development indicated a period subsequent to the employment of the primitive three seasons, but I find from the Western Inscriptions, lately published by Prof. Bhandarkar, that they were clearly in contemporaneous acceptance. While a passage in Hiouen Thsang suggests that the retention of the normal terms was in a measure typical of Buddhist belief, and so that, in another sense, the months had a confessed conventional significance. "Suivant la sainte doctrine de Jou-laï (du Tathagata), une année se compose de trois saisons. Depuis le 16 du premier mois, jusqu'au 15 du cinquième mois, c'est la saison chaude. Depuis le 16 du cinquième mois, jusqu'au 15 du neuvième mois, c'est la saison pluvieuse (Varchás). Depuis le 16 de neuvième mois, jusqu'au 15 du premier mois, c'est la saison froide. Quelquefois on divise l'année en quatre saisons, savoir: le printemps, l'été, l'automne et l'hiver."-Hiouen Thsang, vol. ii. p. 63. The division into three seasons is distinctly no-Vedic.-Muir, vol. i. p. 13; Elliot, Glossary, vol. ii. p. 47. "There are two summers in the year and two harvests, while the winter intervenes between them."-Pliny vi. 21; Diod. Sic. I. c. i. The parallel series are more scattered, and crop up in less direct consecutive association, these are indorsed in the Bactrian or Aryan adaptation of the Ancient Phoenician alphabet. Bahawalpur. INDO-SCYTHIAN INSCRIPTIONS. In the Bactrian-Páli Alphabet. Maharaja Rajadiraja DEVAPUTRA Kanishka. Samvat 11, on the 28th of the (Greek) month of Dæsius. Manikyala Tope. Maharaja Kaneshka, GUSHANA vaşa samvardhaka. Wardak Vase. "Increaser of the dominion of the Gushans" (Kushans). Samvat 18. Maharaja rajatiraja Huveshka. Samvat 51, 15th of Artemisius.1 1 Besides these inscriptions, there is a record of the name of Kanishka designated as Raja Gandharya, on "a rough block of quartz," from Zeda, near Ohind, now in the Lahore Museum. This legend is embodied in very small Bactrian letters, and is preceded by a single line in large characters, which reads as follows: San 10+1 (=11) Ashadasa masasa di 20, Udeyana gu. 1. Isachhu nami." I do not quote or definitively adopt this date, as the two inscriptions appear to me to be of different periods, and vary in a marked degree in the forms as well as in the size of their letters.-Lowenthal, J.A.S.B. 1863, p. 5; Gen. Cunningham, Arch. Report, vol. v. p. 57. In addition to the above Bactrian Páli Inscriptions, we have a record from Taxila, by the "Satrap Liako Kusuluko," in "the 78th year of the great king, the Great Moga, on the 5th day of the month Panamus" (J.R.A.S. xx. o.s. p. 227; J.A.S.B. 1862, p. 40). And an inscription from Takht-i-Bahi of the IndoParthian king Gondophares, well known to us from his coins (Ariana Antiqua, p. 340, Prinsep's Essays, vol. ii. p. 214), and doubtfully associated with the Gondoferus of the Legenda Aurea, to the following tenor: " Maharayasa Gudupharasa Vasha 20+4+2 (26) San .. Satimae 100+3 (103) Vesakhasa masasa divase 4." (Cunningham, Arch. Rep. vol. v. p. 59.) And to complete the series of regal quotations, I add the heading of the inscription from Panjtar of a king of the Kushans: "Sam 100+20+2 (=122) Sravanasa masasa di prathame 1, Maha rayasa Gushanasa Ra (Professor Dowson, J.R.A.S. Vol. XX. o.s. p. 223; Cunningham, Arch. Rep. vol. v. p. 61.) This is an inscription which, in the exceptional character of its framework, suggests and even necessitates reconstructive interpretations. The stone upon which it is engrossed was obviously fissured and imperfectly prepared for its purpose in the first instance; so that, in the opening line, Gondophares' name has to be taken over a broken gap with space for two letters, which divides the d from the ph. The surface of the stone has likewise suffered from abrasion of some kind or other, so that material letters have in certain cases been reduced to mere shadowy outlines. But enough remains intact to establish the name of the IndoParthian King, and to exhibit a double record of dates, giving his regnal year and the counterpart in an era the determination of which is of the highest possible importance. The vasha or year of the king, expressed in figures alone, as 26, is not contested. The figured date of the leading era presents no difficulty whatever to those who are conversant with Phoenician notation, or who may hereafter choose to consult the ancient coins of Aradus. The symbol for hundreds Kis incontestable. The preliminary stroke 1, to the right of the sign, in |