INDIA (lIrl ; Sept. '11181K7)). This name oc curs only in Esther i. ; viii. 9, where the Persian king is described as reigning from India unto Ethiopia, over a hundred and seven and twenty provinces.' It is found again, however, in the Apocrypha, where India is mentioned among the countries which the Romans took from Antiochus and gave to Eumenes (r Maccab. viii. 8). It is also with some reason conceived that in Acts ii. 9 we should read 'Ipatav, India, and not 'Ioaaiau, Judma. If this could be admitted, an interesting subject of inquiry would arise ; for these dwellers in Indio.—that is, Jews of India—are described as being present in Jerusalem at the Passover. There is much to say in favour of this reading, but more in favour of Idumas.a.; for the name of that coun try, 'I.5ovnalcrp, might, much more easily than that of India, 'Imaiav, have been accidentally, or rather carelessly, corrupted into 'Ioaatav : and, at the same tune, the name of Idumzea woukl come better into the list than that of India, seeing that the enumeration is manifestly taken from east to west ; which allows Iduma with great propriety to follow Mesopotamia, but forbids India to do so. Whichever may be preferred of the other two, the reading Juda' cannot but be wrong ; for., on the face of the list, we cannot but see the superfluous ness of the information, that the people of Judma were present in their own city at the Passover.
It is evident on the face of the above intima tions, and indeed from all ancient history, that the country known. as India in ancient times extended more to the west, and did not reach so far to the east—that is, was not known so far to the east— as the India of the moderns. When we read of ancient India, we must clearly not understand the whole of Hindostan, but chiefly the northern parts of it, or the countries between the Indus and the G.an,ges ; although it is not necessary to assert that the rest of that peninsula, particularly its western coast, vvas then altogether unknown. It was from this quarter that the Persians and Greeks (to whom we are indebted for the earliest accounts of India) invaded the country ; and this was consequently the region which first became generally known. The countries bordering on the Ganges continued to be involved in obscurity, the great kingdom of the Pmsians excepted, which, situated nearly above the modem Bengal, was dimly discernible. The
nearer we approach the Indus, the more clear be comes our knowledge of the ancient geography of the country ; and it follows that the districts of which at the present day we know the least were anciently best known. Besides, the western and northern boundaries were not the same as at pre sent. To the west, India was not then bounded by the river Indus, but by a chain of mountains which, under the name of Koh (whence the Gre cian appellation of the Caucasus), extended from Bactria to Makran, or Gedrosia, enclosing the kingdoms of Candahar and Cabul, the modern kingdom of Eastern Persia, or Afghanistan. These districts anciently formed part of India, as well as, further to the south, the less perfectly known countries of the Arabi and Haurs (the Arabiti:e and Oritm of Arrian, vi. 21), bordering on Gedrosia. This western boundary continued at all times the same, and was removed to the Indus only in con sequence of the victories of Nadir Shah.
Towards the north, ancient India overpassed not less its present limit. It comprehended the whole of the mountainous region above Cashmir, Badakshan, Belur Land, the western boundary mountains of Little Bucharia, or Little Thibet, and even the desert of Cobi, so far as it was known. Thc discovery of a passage by sea to the coasts of India has contributed to withdraw from these regions the attention of Europeans, and left them in an obscurity which hitherto has been little dis turbed, although the current of events seems likely ere long to lead to our better knowledge.
From this it appears that the India of Scripture included no part of the present India, seeing that it was confined to the territories possessed by the Persians and the Syrian Greeks, that never ex tended beyond the Indus, which, since the time of Nadir Shah, has been regarded as the western boundary of India. Something of India. beyond the Indus became known through the conquering march of Alexander, and still more through that of Seleucus Nicator, who penetrated to the banks of the Ganges ; but the notions thus obtained are not embraced in the Sciiptural notices, which, both in the canonical and the Apocryphal text, are confined to Persian India. (See Heeren's Historical Re searckes, c. 1, sec. 3, on _Persian ; and Rennel's Geos-. Herodotus.)