What was Bactra known for?

Bactria was the centre of Iranian resistance against the Macedonian invaders after the fall of the Achaemenid Empire in the 4th century BCE, but eventually fell to Alexander the Great.

What is Indo bactrians?

The Bactrian Greeks moved into the south of the Hindu Kush area by the early 2nd century BCE. Indo-Greeks are these groups of these Bactrian Greeks that ruled over north-western India between the 2nd century BCE and early 1st century CE. NCERT notes on Indo-Greek rule are important for the IAS Exam.

What is Bactria now called?

Bactria, also called Bactriana or Zariaspa, ancient country lying between the mountains of the Hindu Kush and the Amu Darya (ancient Oxus River) in what is now part of Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan.

What do you know about Bactrian kingdom?

The Bactrian Kingdom, known to historians as the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom or simply Greco-Bactria, was a Hellenistic-era Greek state, and along with the Indo-Greek Kingdom, the easternmost part of the Hellenistic world in Central Asia and the Indian Subcontinent from its founding in 256 BC by Diodotus I Soter to its fall …

Why was Balkh Afghanistan important to the Silk Road?

With the lands through which the caravans passed divided into a few stable states, Balkh owed its early stability to nearby settlements co-existing and cooperating in the interests of trade. As such Balkh flourished as a depot point for the world’s luxuries.

Who were the yuezhi?

Yuezhi, Wade-Giles romanization Yüeh-chih, also called Indo-Scyth, ancient people who ruled in Bactria and India from about 128 bce to about 450 ce. The Yuezhi are first mentioned in Chinese sources at the beginning of the 2nd century bce as nomads living in the western part of Gansu province, northwestern China.

Who were also known as Yavanas?

Indian sources of that time regarded the Yavanas as a barbarian people of the northwest. From the beginning of the Christian era the word was often used loosely to refer to any foreigner; and at a much later date it frequently applied to the Muslim invaders of India.

What language did the bactrians speak?

Bactrian (Αριαο, Aryao, [arjaː]) is an extinct Eastern Iranian language formerly spoken in the Central Asian region of Bactria (in present-day Afghanistan) and used as the official language of the Kushan, and the Hephthalite empires.

What did the ancient Greeks call Afghanistan?

Bactria
Bactria: The Ancient Greek State in Afghanistan.

Where is sogdiana?

Uzbekistan
The Sogdians were an Iranian people whose homeland, Sogdiana, was located at the center of several of those routes, in present-day Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. First recorded in the 5th century BCE as a province of the Achaemenid Persian Empire Fig.

Who called Yavanas?

Yavana, in early Indian literature, either a Greek or another foreigner. The word appears in Achaemenian (Persian) inscriptions in the forms Yauna and Ia-ma-nu and referred to the Ionian Greeks of Asia Minor, who were conquered by the Achaemenid king Cyrus the Great in 545 bc.

What did the Mongols do to Balkh?

In 1220 Genghis Khan sacked Balkh, butchered its inhabitants and levelled all the buildings capable of defence – treatment to which it was again subjected in the 14th century by Timur.

Was Zoroaster from Balkh?

Though contested, Zoroaster, the ancient Iranian spiritual leader who founded this religion, is said to have lived and died here, and first preached his religion in the Balkh region.

What is Yavanas and sakas?

Sakas are described in Sanskrit sources as a Mleccha tribe grouped along with the Yavanas, Tusharas and Barbaras. There were a group of Sakas called Apa Sakas meaning water dwelling Sakas, probably living around some lake in central Asian steppes. Sakas took part in Kurukshetra War.

Why are Greeks called Yavanas?

Why is Menander remembered?

290 BC) was a Greek dramatist and the best-known representative of Athenian New Comedy. He wrote 108 comedies and took the prize at the Lenaia festival eight times….

Menander
Education	Student of Theophrastus at the Lyceum
Genre	New Comedy
Notable works	Dyskolos Samia

Who was Menander in ancient India?

Menander, also spelled Minedra or Menadra, Pali Milinda, (flourished 160 bce? –135 bce?), the greatest of the Indo-Greek kings and the one best known to Western and Indian classical authors.

What is the meaning of Bactrian?

(Placename) of or relating to Bactria, n. (Placename) a native or inhabitant of Bactria. dromedary, Bactrian – A one-hump camel is a dromedary (from Latin, meaning “swift camel,” from Greek dromas, “runner”) and a two-hump camel is a Bactrian (from Bactria in Asia).

What were the religious beliefs of Bactria?

At this time, Buddhist beliefs mingled with the earlier amalgam of Zoroastrian and Hellenistic religious practices common in the area. Another name for the Kushan-controlled Bactria was “Tokharistan,” because the Indo-European Yuezhi were also called the Tocharians.

What is the history of Bactria?

Archaeological evidence and early Greek accounts indicate that the area east of Persia and northwest of India has been home to organized empires since at least 2,500 BCE, and possibly much longer. The great philosopher Zoroaster or Zarathustra is said to have come from Bactria.

What is the geography of Bactria?

Geography. Bactria, the territory of which Bactra [ Balkh] was the capital, originally consisted of the area south of the Āmū Daryā with its string of agricultural oases dependent on water taken from the rivers of Balḵ (Bactra) [Balkh], Tashkurgan, Kondūz [Kunduz], Sar-e Pol, and Šīrīn Tagāō [ Shirin Tagab ].