GREECE, a celebrated country in Europe, famed for the military exploits, learning, and arts of its inhabitants. .The people of Greece call their country Ionia. It is the Yuuan of the Mahomedans, whose people the Hindus style Yavana. It has produced many men famed throughout the world,—Alexander the Great, his teacher Aristotle, Socrates, Hippocrates Plato, who are not mentioned by Hindus, a'Ithough known to all the Mahomedans of Asia, as Sikander Rumi, Aristu, Sokrat, Bukrat, and Aflatun. The following Greek and Roman writers were known to the Mahomedans, viz. :— Herodotus,. . . B.c. 450 Clemens Alexand Ctesias, 400 rinns, A D. 200 Onesicritus, . . 325 Eusebius, . . . 320 Megasthenes, . . 300 Festus Avienus, . 380 Strabo, . . . . A.D. 20 Marcian, . . . . 420 Pomponius Mela, . 20 Cosmas Indicopleus Pliny, . . . . . 77 tes, . . . . . 525 Periplus Blari Ery- Stephen of Byzantium, 560 . . . . 80 Ravennotis Anonymi Dionysius Periegetes, 86 Cosmocrraphia, 7th cent.
Ptolemy 130 Georgius.Syncellus, . 800 Arrian, 150 Eustathius, 12th cent.
But the first Greek historian who speaks clearly of India is Hekataios of Miletus (549-486 n.c.) ; the knowledge of Herodotus (450 u.c.) ended at the Indus ; and Ctesias, the physician (401 u.c.) brought back from his residence in Persia only a few facts about the products of India,—its dyes and fabrics, monkeys and parrots. India to the east of the Indus was first made known to Europe by the historians and men of science who accom panied Alexander the Great in 327 B.c. Their narratives, although now lost, are condensed iu Strabo, Pliny, and Arrian. Soon afterwards, Megastheues, as Greek ambassador resident at a court in the centre of Bengal (306-298 u.c.), had opportunities for the closest observation. The knowledge of the Greeks and Romans concerning India practically dat,es from his researches, 300 B.c. Alexander the Great had entered India early in 327 u.c. He crossed the Indus above Attock, and advanced without a struggle over the intervening territory of the Taxiles to the Jhelum (Hydaspes). Having drawn up -his troops at a bend of the Jhelum, about 11 miles west of Chillianwalla, the Greek general crossed under shelter of a tempest uous night. The enemy had 30,000 efficient infantry, 4000 horse, 300 chariots, 200 elephants; and Alexander's army numbered about 50,000, including 5000 Indian auxiliaries under Mophis of Taxila. Alexander found the Raw al Pindi district in possession of the Takka or Takshak, a Scythie race; and, 1300 years afterwards, Mahmud found it in the possession of the Ghakkar, who are still there.
It was from the Takshak that the Greek name of Taxiles was derived. Alexander advanced south e,ast through the kingdom of the younger Porus to Amritsar, and, after a sharp bend backward to the west to fight the Catlimi at Sangala, he reached the Beas (Hyphasis). The country was hostile, and the Greeks held only the land on which they en encamped. At Multan, then as now the capital of the Southern Panjab, he had to fight a pitched battle with the Malli, and was severely wounded in taking the city. His enraged troops put every soul within it to the sword. Further down, near the confluence of the five rivers of the Panjab, he made a long halt, built a town, which lie called Alexandria, and which is the modern Uchh.
Alexander, in 'his advance towards the Indus, had formed military stations in Bactria, and after his demise, when the generals of his armies set up for independence, Bactria was carved into king doms, which, with varying limits, lasted from B.C. 256 to A.D. 207. Lassen supposes the existence of four Greek kingdoms, viz. first, that of Bactria ; a second eastern kingdom under Menander and Apollodotus, comprehending the Panjab and valley of the Indus, with Kabul and Arachotia or Kandahar added in times of its prosperity ; a third, western, at Herat and in Seistan ; a fourth, central, of the Paropamisus, which latter region Mr. Prinsep is inclined to give to Bactria, because of the bilingual as well as the pure Greek coins, of Heliocles and Antimachus, kings of Bactria. Mr. Thomas, in Prinsep's Antiquities, gives Major Cunningham's table. The countries over which the Greeks ruledwere seemingly Bactria, Sogdiana, Margiana, Paropamisidm, Nysa, Aria-Dranga, Arachosia, Ganclharitis, Peukelaotis, Taxila, Pata lene, Syrastrene, and Larice ; but their limits were incessantly varying. The dynasties in Asia, founded after the death of Alexander the Great, by his generals, etc., were as under :— Antiochus Soter succeeded Seleucus Nicator,and, in the reign of his successor, Antiochus Theos, Arsaces, a Scythian, who came from the north of the Sea of Azof, induced the Persians to throw off the Greek yoke, founded the Parthian empire, and made Rhages his capital. This was likewise the period of the foundation of the Bactrian kingdom by Theodotus, the governor of it, who, finding himself cut off from Syria. by the Persian revolution, declared his independence.