BAC'TRIA. The name given in ancient times to a province or country in Central Asia extend ing northward from the Hindu-Kush Mountains as far as the river Oxus (Amu or Jihon), and called also Baetriana by classical writers. The exact extent of this land in early times cannot now be determined, hut it must have been con siderable; and. although barren to the north, its southern regions were rich in pasture lands, which made Bactria famous in antiquity, among other things, for its fine breed of horses. In history it has been the seat of a number of powerful rulers, who are best known as the successors of Alexander the Great in the East. NVhat was formerly Bactria is now included in parts of Afghanistan and Asiatic Russia.
The name of the province or country appears in the Old Persian Inscriptions (Bh. i. 10; Dar. Pers. e. 16; NB. a. 23) as Baxtri, i.e. Bakhtri. It is written in the Avesta MAI.. From this latter came the intermediate form Baxli, Sanskrit Bahirk«, Balhika 'Bactrian,' Armen. Bahl, and by transposition, the Mod. Pers. Bala; i.e. Balkh. The capital city, Balkh (q.v.), or earlier Bactra, was situated on the Dargidns or Bactrus I now Dehas). This city seems also to he known in the classics as Zari aspa. In the Avesta (Vendidad 1.6), and else where, it receives the title 'beautiful' (Av. srira), to which the attribute 'with banners on high' is appended. This additional designation of the capital of Bactria in ancient times was ap parently due to the custom, mentioned by Masudi and Yakut, of pious pilgrims hanging green silk banners from the walls of the Temple Naubehar. This latter name has been supposed to refer to a Buddhist 'New Cloister' (nava-cihara), as we know that Balkh, in the Province of Bactria, was a flourishing seat of Buddhism in the early Christian centuries.
Baetria is supposed to have been origi nally the centre of a powerful kingdom founded more than a thousand years before the Christian era, and exercising extensive sway throughout Iran. The strongest support for the existence of such a kingdom, antedating the Median rule and the Achwinenian sovereignty of the Persian Empire, will be found in Duneker, Gcschichte dee Alterturns (Leipzig, 1878-86). One of the prin cipal arguments brought forward in favor of such a view is the story of the campaign of Ninus of Assyria against a Bactrian king, Zoroaster, as mentioned by Ctesias, and recounted with some variations by Trogus Pompeius (in Justin), Euse bius, and others. The record seems to contain sonic allusion to Zoroaster, the Prophet of an cient Iran (q.v.), whose patron was Vishtaspa, and whose death occurred at Balkh, according to Pirdausi and others, when the city was stormed by the Turanians. For this and similar reasons Bactria is often regarded as the cradle of the ancient Magian religion. (See ZOROASTER.) The bearing of all these passages in their historic light is discussed in Jackson, Zoroastcr, the Prophet of Ancient Iran (New York, 1899). But considerable doubt is attached to the antiquity of the story of Zoroaster's death at Balkh; and so high an authority on Persian history as Justi disclaims the existence of a Bactrian king dom before the time of Alexander the Great. Yet
others may hold a different opinion. However the case may be, there is no doubt that Cyrus subjugated Bactria and made it a Persian prov ince; and Darius in his inscriptions includes Bactria as one of the countries tributary to the Achasnenian power. Ilerodotus enumerates the forces which Bactria contributed to the Persian invasion of Greece.
From the time of Alexander, the history of Bactria becomes clearer, and may be followed with more detail. When he conquered the rest of Iran, Bactria likewise fell before his power, and he made Iloxana, daughter of the Bactrian ruler Oxyartes, his wife, B.C. 327. On leaving Persia, he assigned a strong force of Greeks to occupy Bactria, and it thus became part of the kingdom of the Seleucithe (q.v.). About u.c. 256. with the revolt of the satrap Diodotns I., a new Grieco Bactrian kingdom was established, whose power ultimately extended as far as Northern India, although in Iran it had to give place to the Parthian sway. The history of this later Grieco Bactrian kingdom has been cleared up. in large measure, by means of the coins and other an tiquities which have been discovered in recent times, especially in Afghanistan. The Greek and later the Prakrit devices and inscriptions on these coins give a 7, eries of royal names whose succession has been fixed with comparative accuracy.
The inhabitants of ancient Bactria (modern Balkh) were closely related to the Persians, and shared in, if they did not produce, the old Aryan culture of this region from which sprang Zoroastrianism, the Indo-llactrian alphabet, etc. It was in this part of the world that ethnolo gists formerly sought the primitive home of the Aryan stock, but that assumption is now largely abandoned. _Nevertheless an early presence of Aryan peoples here is undoubted, and their in fluence went both east and west. Of recent litera ture, reference may be made to Biddu1ph's Tribes of the llindoo-Koosh (London, 1881) and Geiger's Die Pamir-Gebiete (Vienna, 1887), besides the numerous studies of Tjfal•y on the Aryans of these regions, contained especially in his Expe dition scientifique francaise en Russie. en Siberie, rt dons le Turkestan (Paris, 1S78-SO) and .tus dear westliehen Ilimalaja (Leipzig, 1884). On the general question of the Bactrian kingdom, consult: F. .Tusti, Des bakt•ische Reich; Geiger and Kuhn, Grundriss der iranisehen Philologie, Vol. 11. (Strassburg, 3895) ; Gutsohmid, Geschichte Irons (Strasshurg, 1887) :Wilson, driana Antigna (London, 1841) ; and Lassen, Indisehe A iterthuniskundc (Bonn, 1849). On the coins. consult: Percy Gardner. The Coins of the Greek and Ncythio Kings of Baetria and India (Lon don, 1886) ; and E. Thomas, "Bactrian Coins," in 'Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (London, 1873).