Part 3

On leaving the Arabios the fleet, coasting the shores of the Oreitai, arrived at Kôkala, a place near Râs Kachar, where Nearchos landed, and was joined by the division of the army under Leonnatus, from whom he received a supply of provisions for his ships. From Kôkala, a course of 500 stadia brought him to the estuary of the Tomêros, or, as it is now called, the river Hingol. All connection between the fleet and the army was thenceforth lost until the district of Harmozia, in Karmania, was reached. The coast of the Oreitai extended westward from the Arabios to the great rocky headland of Malan, which still bears the name given to it in Arrian, Malana—a distance of fully 100 miles. The desolate shores of the Ichthyophagi succeeded, and inland lay the vast sandy wastes of Gedrosia. Between Cape Malan and the mouth of the Anamis river in Harmozia, from which Nearchos, with a small retinue, proceeded inland to meet Alexander, no fewer than twenty-one names of places at which the fleet touched are recorded in the narrative of the voyage. Most of these have been identified by Major Mockler, the political agent of Makrân. We can refer to only one or two of the more notable. From Cape Malan the fleet proceeded to Bagisâra, which, Colonel Holdich tells us, is likely enough the Dimizaar or eastern bay of the Urmara headland. The Pasiris, who are mentioned as a people of this neighbourhood, have left frequent traces of their existence along the coast. At Kalama, now Khor Khalmat, which was reached on the second day from Urmara, there can be traced a very considerable extension of the land seawards, which would have completely altered the course of the fleet from the present coasting tract. The island of Karbine, which was distant 100 stadia from Kalama, cannot, our author points out, be the island of Astola, but is probably a headland now connected with the mainland by a low sandy waste. Astola, however, he takes to be the island sacred to the sun, which Arrian calls Nosala, and places at a distance of 100 stadia from the mainland. The nearest land to it is Ras Jaddi or Koh Zarên, in the neighbourhood of which was Mosarna, where Nearchos took on board a pilot, by whom thenceforth the course of the fleet was directed. The next place of importance was Barna, called by others Bâdara, and this Mockler identifies with Gwâdar. The following identifications succeed:—Dendrobosa with the west point of Gwâdar headland, Kôphas with Pishikân Bay, Bagia with Cape Brês, Tâlmena with a harbour in Chahbar Bay, Kanate with Karatee, Dagasira with Jakeisar, near the mouth of the Jageen river, Bâdis with Kôh Mubârak, and the mouth of the Anamis river with a point north by east from the island of Ormus. The distances which Arrian records as run by the fleet from day to day are generally excessive, especially after it had left the mouth of the Arabios.

We must now resume consideration of the movements of Alexander himself. When we left him he had reached the banks of the Arabios, at a point distant some twenty miles from Sonmiyâni, or perhaps even higher up the river. On crossing the stream he turned to his left towards the sea, and with a picked force made a sudden descent on the Oreitai. After a night’s march he came to a well-inhabited district, defeated the Oreitai, and penetrated to their capital—a mere village called Rambakia, which Colonel Holdich places at or near Khairkot. The Oreitai themselves are, in his opinion, represented by the Lumri tribes of Las Bela, who are of Rajput descent. From Rambakia Alexander proceeded with a part of his troops to force the narrow pass which the Gadrôsoi and the Oreitai had conjointly seized with the design of stopping his progress. This defile was most probably the turning pass at the northern end of the Hala range. The Gadrôsoi seem to owe their name to the Gadurs, one of the Lumri clans, from which, however, they hold themselves somewhat distinct. Alexander, after clearing the pass, pushed on through a desert country into the territory of the Gadrôsoi, and drew down to the coast. He must then, says our author, have followed the valley of the Phur to the coast, and pushed on along the track of the modern telegraph line till he reached the neighbourhood of the Hingol river, where he halted to collect supplies for the fleet. On this part of the route were the tamarisk trees which yielded myrrh, the mangrove swamps, the euphorbias with prickly shoots, and the roots of spikenard.

Beyond this he could no longer pursue his march along the coast in order to keep in touch with the fleet. The huge barrier of the Malan range, which abutted direct on the sea, stopped his way. There was no goat track in those days, such as, after infinite difficulty, helped the telegraph line over. He was consequently forced into the interior. Taking the only route that was possible, he followed up the Hingol till he could turn the Malan by the first available pass westward. Nothing here, we are told, has altered since his days. The magnificent peaks and mountains which surround the sacred shrine of Hinglaz are “everlasting hills,” and it was through these that he proceeded to make his way. The windings of the Hingol river he followed for 40 miles up to its junction with the Parkan. The bed of this stream leads westward from the Hingol, and skirts the north of the Taloi range. Alexander had thus for the first time a chance of turning the Malan block, and directing his march westward to the sea. He therefore pushed his way through this low valley, which was flanked by the Taloi hills, that rose on his left to a height of 2000 feet. All the region at their base was a wilderness of sandy hillocks and scanty grass-covered waste, which could afford his troops no supplies and no shelter from the fierce autumn heat. All the miseries of his retreat, which are so graphically depicted by his historians, were concentrated into the distance between the Hingol and the point where he regained the coast. The Parkan route should have led him to the river Basol, but having lost his way, he must have emerged near the harbour of Pasnî, almost on the line of the present telegraph. The distance from the Hingol to Pasnî our author estimates at about 200 miles; but in Curzon’s well-known map of Persia it appears as if only 150.

From Pasnî Alexander marched for seven days along the coast till he reached the well-known highway to Karmania. He could only leave the coast near the Dasht river and strike into the valley of the Bahu, which would lead him to Bampur, the capital of Gadrosia. This part of the march probably occupied nearly a month. It has been doubted whether Bampur was, in Alexander’s time, the capital of Gadrosia, rather than the place on the edge of the Kirman desert, called indifferently Fahraj, Purag, and Pura, where there are extensive ruins of a very ancient date. Colonel Holdich, however, adduces arguments which suffice to set aside the claims advanced in favour of Fahraj. Bampur is as old as Fahraj, and has in its neighbourhood the site of a city still older, and now called Pura and Purag. Besides, in order to reach Fahraj, Alexander must have passed Bampur, since there is no other way consistent with Arrian’s account. With regard to the route pursued by Krateros with the heavy transport and invalids, our author points out that it was probably by the Mulla (and not the Bolan) pass to Kelat and Quetta. Thence he must have taken the Kandahar route to the Helmund, and followed that river down to the fertile plains of lower Seistan, whence he crossed the Kirman desert by a well-known modern caravan route and joined Alexander at or near Kirman.

Since the publication of his lecture, of which we have thus summarised the contents, Colonel Holdich has contributed to the _Journal of the Royal Geographical Society_ (January 1896), an article on “The Origin of the Kafîr of the Hindu-Kush,” which contains some very interesting notices regarding Alexander as he fought his way from the Hindu-Kush to the banks of the Indus. The route by which the conqueror himself advanced with one division of his army, while the other division, which was more heavily armed, advanced by the Khaibar Pass, is thus described by our author:—

“The recognised road to India from Central Asia was that which passed through the plains of Kabul, by the Kabul river, into Laghmân or Lamghân, and thence by the open Dasht-i-Gumbaz into the lower Kunar. From the Kunar valley this road, even to the time of Baber’s invasion of India (early in the sixteenth century), crossed the comparatively low intervening range into Bajour; thence to the valley of the Panj-Kora and Swat, and out into India by the same passes with which we have now (after nearly 400 years) found it convenient to enter the same district.”

A reference to our notes, B. C. D. E., in the Appendix, will show that this view of the route is that which we ourselves had adopted. His views with regard to the position of Massaga, Aornos, and Embolima are also coincident with those at which we had arrived. Dyrta he takes to have been the place now known as Dir. That opinion was held by such great authorities as Court and Lassen, but we have pointed out an objection to it in p. 76, n. 3. To Nysa, which, as will be seen by a reference to our long note pp. 338-340, we have identified with the Nagara or Dionysopolis of Ptolemy (B. vii., 43), thus placing it at a distance of four or five miles west of Jalâlâbâd and near the Kabul river, Colonel Holdich assigns a different locality.

“The Nysaeans,” he says, “whose city Alexander spared, were the descendants of those conquerors, who, coming from the west, were probably deterred by the heat of the plains of India from carrying their conquests south of the Punjab. They settled on the cool and well-watered slopes of those mountains which crown the uplands of Swat and Bajour, where they cultivated the vine for generations.... It seems possible that they may have extended their habitat as far eastward as the upper Swat valley and the mountain region of the Indus, and at one time may have occupied the site of the ancient capital of the Assakenoi, Massaga, which there is reason to suppose stood in about the position now occupied by the town of Manglaor.”

The hill in the neighbourhood of Nysa called Mount Mêros, which was clad with ivy, laurel, and vine-trees, he identifies with the Koh-i-Mor or Mountain of Mor, and gives this account of it:—

“On the right bank of the Panj-Kora river (the ancient Ghoura), nearly opposite to its junction with the river of Swat (Suastos), is a very conspicuous mountain, whose three-headed outline can be distinctly seen from the Peshawar cantonment, known as the Koh-i-Mor or Mountain of Mor. On the southern slopes of this mountain, near the foot of it, is a large scattered village called Nuzar or Nasar. The sides of the mountain spurs are clothed with the same forest and jungle that is common to the mountains of Kafiristan, and to the hills intervening between Kafiristan and the Koh-i-Mor. Amid this jungle are to be found the wild vine and ivy.”

In note B.—Nikaia—page 332, some remarks will be found regarding the Kafîrs. Colonel Holdich describes them similarly, but upholds the view, rejected by Elphinstone, of their Greek origin. The best known of them, he points out, are the Kamdesh Kafîrs from the lower valley of the Bashgol, a large affluent of the Kunar river, which it joins from the north-west, some forty miles below Chitral. He then continues:—

“In the case of the Kamdesh Kafîr, at least, the tradition of Greek or Pelasgic origin seems likely to be verified in a very remarkable way. Scientific inquiry has been converging on him from several directions, and it seems possible that the ethnographical riddle connected with his existence will be solved ere long. In appearance he is of a distinct Aryan type, with low forehead, and prominent aquiline features, entirely free from Tartar or Mongolian traits; his eyes, though generally dark, are frequently of a light grey colour; his complexion is fair enough to pass for Southern European; his figure is always slight, but indicating marvellous activity and strength; and the modelling of his limbs would furnish study for a sculptor.”

Colonel Holdich subsequently calls our attention to certain strange inscriptions found in the valley of the Indus east of Swat, and engraved, most of them, on stone slabs built into towers which are now in ruins. These inscriptions, on being subjected to a congress of Orientalists, were pronounced to be in an unknown tongue. They may possibly, he adds, be found to be vastly more ancient than the towers they adorned, it being, at any rate, a notable fact about them that some of them “recall a Greek alphabet of archaic type.” He concludes his observations regarding the Kafîrs in these terms: “I cannot but believe them to be the modern representatives of that very ancient western race, the Nysaeans—so ancient that the historians of Alexander refer to their origin as mythical.”

I may, in conclusion, advert, in a word, to an article of great ability, contributed to the _Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society_ for October 1894, in which the writer endeavours to show that Alexander reached the Indus by a widely different route from that which is indicated in our pages, although it is also the route which, in its main outlines, has been determined by the best authorities—men of high military rank, personally acquainted with the country, and scholars of the greatest eminence. As the selection of the route advocated was mainly based on the opinion which the writer had formed as to the point whereat Alexander had effected his passage of the Indus, it will suffice to refute his theory if we prove that his opinion is altogether untenable. In his view, the Indus was crossed, not at Attock, but much higher up stream, at a point between Amb and the mouth of the Barhind river, the Parenos of the Greeks. Now, while the passage at Attock is that which, from time immemorial, has been used as the easiest means of access into India from the west, the passage higher up is much more difficult and dangerous, for though the river is not there so wide, its current is much more impetuous, while the banks are, at the same time, much steeper. Had Alexander notwithstanding attempted to cross at that point, he would have had to encounter a desperate resistance on the part of his determined enemy Abisares, in whose dominions he would have found himself on reaching the eastern bank. He made, however, no such foolhardy attempt either here or afterwards at the Hydaspes. We find, as a matter of fact, that when he made the passage he met with no opposition, but was most hospitably received by his vassal, the King of Taxila, in whose dominions Attock was situated. The writer, it would appear, has been led to his erroneous assumption by applying to the Indus _specially_ the remark in Strabo (quoted at page 64, note 4) regarding the rivers of Northern Afghânistân _generally_, that Alexander wished to cross them as near their sources as possible. The remark, we may be certain, had no reference to the Indus at all, for Alexander could not but have learned from Taxiles, who had joined him at Nikaia before the two divisions of his army separated, where the Indus could best be crossed. Taxiles, moreover, accompanied the division which advanced towards the Indus by the Khaibar Pass, with instructions to make all the necessary preparations for the passage of the whole army. Could such instructions have been given if the point where the passage was to be made had still to be discovered? A reference to Baber’s _Memoirs_ will show with what ease that other great conqueror transported his army into India by using the Attock passage.

_A sixth volume, containing descriptions of India by Strabo and Pliny, together with incidental notices of India by other classical writers, is in course of preparation, and will complete the series._

PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION

En inventant l’histoire, la Grèce inventa le jugement du monde, et, dans ce jugement, l’arrêt de la Grèce fut sans appel. A celui dont la Grèce n’a pas parlé, l’oubli, c’est-à-dire le néant. A celui dont la Grèce se souvient, la gloire, c’est-à-dire la vie.—_Discours de M. Ernest Renan du 5 Mai 1892._

This work is the fifth of a series which may be entitled _Ancient India as described by the Classical Writers_, since it was projected to supply annotated translations of all the accounts of India which have descended to us from classical antiquity. The volumes which have already appeared contain the fragments of the _Indika_ of Ktêsias the Knidian, and of the _Indika_ of Megasthenês, the _Indika_ of Arrian, the _Periplous of the Erythraian Sea_ by an unknown author, and Ptolemy’s _Geography of India and the other Countries of Eastern Asia_. A sixth work, containing translations of the chapters in Strabo’s _Geography_ which describe _India and Ariana_, is in preparation, and will complete the series. I cannot at present say whether this work will appear as a separate publication, or will be included in a volume containing new and revised editions of the three _Indikas_ mentioned above, which are now nearly out of print, as are also the other two works of the series.

In the present work I have translated and annotated all the earliest and most authentic records which have been preserved of the Macedonian invasion of India under Alexander the Great. The notes do not touch on points either of grammar or of textual criticism, but are mainly designed to illustrate the statements advanced in the narratives. When short, they accompany the text as footnotes, and when of such a length as would too much encumber the pages, they have been placed together in an appendix by themselves. Such notes again as refer to _persons_ have been placed, whether short or long, in a second appendix, which I have designated a _Biographical Appendix_.

In preparing the translations and notes I have consulted a great many works, of which the following may be specified as those which I found most useful:—

Droysen’s _Geschichte Alexanders des Grossen_.

Williams’s _Life of Alexander_.

Sainte-Croix’s _Examen Critique des Anciens Historiens d’Alexandre le Grand_.

C. Müller’s _collection of the remaining fragments of the Historians of Alexander the Great_.

Thirlwall’s _History of Greece_, vols. vi. and vii.

Grote’s _History of Greece_, vol. xii.

Duncker’s _History of Antiquity_, vol. iv., which treats of India exclusively.

Talboys Wheeler’s _History of India_.

Le Clerc’s _Criticism upon Curtius_, prefixed to Rooke’s Translation of Arrian’s _Anabasis_.

Lassen’s _Indische Alterthumskunde_.

General Sir A. Cunningham’s _Geography of Ancient India_.

V. de Saint-Martin’s _Étude sur la Géographie Grecque et Latine de l’Inde_, and his _Mémoire Analytique sur la carte de l’Asie Centrale et de l’Inde_.

Rennell’s _Memoir of a Map of Hindoostan_.

Bunbury’s _History of Ancient Geography_.

Abbott’s _Gradus ad Aornon_.

_Journal Asiatique._ Serie VIII.

_Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society._ New Series.

Mahaffy’s _Alexander’s Empire_ and his _Greek Life_ and _Thought from the Age of Alexander to the Roman Conquest_.

Professor Freeman’s _Essay on Alexander the Great_.

General Chesney’s _Lecture on the Indian Campaign of Alexander_.

Wesseling’s Latin Translation of Diodôros.

Translations of Curtius by Digby, Pratt, and Vaugelas respectively.

The Notes to the Elzevir edition of Curtius.

Chinnock’s Translation of Arrian’s _Anabasis of Alexander_, and Notes thereto.

Chaussard’s Translation of Arrian into French.

Moberly’s _Alexander the Great in the Punjaub_, from Arrian. Book V.

Burton’s _Sindh_.

Weber’s _Die Griechen in Indien_.

Dr. Bellew’s _Ethnography of Afghanistan_.

Sir W. W. Hunter’s and Professor Max Müller’s Works on India.

The Translations are strictly literal, but though such, will, I trust, be found to give, without crudeness of diction, a faithful reflex not only of the sense, but also of the spirit, force, fluency, and perspicuity of the original compositions. I have at all events spared no pains to combine in the translations the two merits of being at once literal and idiomatic in expression.

In translating Arrian I adopted the text of Sintenis (2nd edition, Berlin, 1863); and with regard to Curtius, I found the work entitled _Alexander in India_, edited by Heitland and Raven, very serviceable, containing, as it does, exactly that portion of Curtius which it was my purpose to translate. Both the works referred to contain valuable _prolegomena_ and notes, to which I must here acknowledge my obligations.

The Introduction consists of two parts. In the first, I have pointed out the sources whence our knowledge of the history of Alexander has been derived, and discussed their title to credibility; while in the second, I have sketched Alexander’s career, and added a very brief summary of the events that followed his death till the wars for the division of his empire were finally composed.

In the transcription of Greek proper names I have followed as hitherto the method introduced by Grote, which scholars have now generally adopted. A vindication of the method which, to my thinking, is unanswerable, has appeared in the preface to Professor Freeman’s _History of Sicily_, a work which the author unfortunately has not lived to complete.

The most noticeable change resulting from this method is the substitution of _K_ for _C_ in the spelling of Greek names. This should be borne in mind by those who may have occasion to consult either the Biographical Appendix or the General Index. I may further note that in transcribing Sanskrit or other Indian names I have in all cases used the circumflex to distinguish the long _â_, which is sounded as _a_ in _fall_, from the short _a_, which is sounded as _u_ in _dumb_. In Sanskrit and its derivative dialects this short vowel (अ) is never written unless it begin a word, for it is supposed to be inherent in every consonant. The letter _ś_ with the acute accent represents the palatal sibilant (श), which is sounded like _sh_.

Two maps accompany the work, the larger of which shows the entire line of the route which Alexander followed in the course of his Asiatic expedition, while the smaller shows more distinctly that part of his route which lay through the northern parts of Afghânistân and the Country of the Five Rivers. For both I consulted the latest and most authoritative maps, both British and German, in which these routes have been laid down, and I found them in pretty close agreement, except with regard to that part of the route which is traced in the smaller map. Here I have generally followed the sketch map of the Panjâb which is given in General Cunningham’s _Ancient Geography of India_, but have ventured to differ from him with regard to the position of the Rock Aornos, of Alexander’s bridge over the Indus, of Sangala, and of the Oxydrakai, whom I have placed, as in Sir E. H. Bunbury’s map, to the south of the Malloi.

The frontispiece to the volume, reproduced from a fifteenth-century French MS. of the Life of Alexander, may, it is hoped, appeal to many as a quaint rendering of a widely “popular” incident.