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Eastern border of the Achaemenid
Empire.
Achaemenid invasion of the Indus Valley
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Achaemenid invasion of Indus valley is the Achaemenid military
conquests of territories of South Asia west of Indus river in 6th century
BC, consisting mainly of modern-day Pakistan.
[1]
Achaemenid
penetration into the modern Pakistan occurred in stages, starting from
northern parts of Indus river and moving southward.
[2]
The Persian
empires considered the Indus river as their eastern most boundary.
Contents
1 Historical background
2 See also
3 References
4 External links
Historical background
The important communities in the region were the people of Punjab, the Kambojas and Sindhis. Punjab consisted
of Taksas of Gandhara, the Madras and Kathas (Kathaioi) on Akesines, the Mallas on Hydraotis and the Tugras
on Hesidros. In the first half of the sixth century, these several small principalities fought against one another. This
region did not have any powerful state to wield the warring communities into one organized kingdom. The area was
wealthy, and could be entered through the passes of the Hindu Kush. The Achaemenids took advantage of the
political disunity and penetrated into the region.
Gandhara/Taxila in Punjab was conquered by Achaemenid empire in 518 BC.
[3]
During this time, Pushkarasakti, a
contemporary of King Bimbisara (558491 BC) of Magadha empire of Haryanka dynasty, was the king of
Gandhara. Pushkarasakti was engaged in power struggles against his local rivals. Achaemenids under Darius
penetrated to the region in 516 BC, and annexed other parts of Punjab west to Indus river and Sindh.
The upper Indus region, comprising Gandhara and Kamboja, formed the 7th, Gandhara satrapy of the Achaemenid
Empire (including Sattagydians, Dadicae, Aparytae), while the lower and middle Indus, respectively comprising
Sindh and Sauvira, constituted the 20th satrapy (called Indian/Sindh/Hindu Satrapy).
[4]
The conquered area was the most fertile and populous region of the Achaemenid Empire. Indus Valley was already
fabled for its gold; the province was able to supply gold dust equal in value to the very large amount of 4680 silver
talents. The Persian writers brought the Kharoshthi script to South Asia during these period. Under the Persian rule,
a system of centralized administration with a bureaucratic system was introduced in the region and scholars such as
Pini and Kautilya lived in the environment. A certain amount of Indus Valley people were recruited to the Persian
army in that time, and Achaemenid ruler Xerxes employed them in his wars against the Greeks.
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By about 380 BC, the Persian hold on the region was weakening, but the area continued to be a part of the
Achaemenid Empire until Alexander's invasion.
[5]
The ancient Greeks also had some knowledge of the area. Darius I appointed the Greek Scylax of Caryanda to
explore the Indian Ocean from the mouth of the Indus to Suez. Scylax provides an account of the voyage in his
book Periplous. Hecataeus of Miletus (500 BC) and Herodotus (483431 BC) also wrote about the Indus
Satrapy of the Persians.
See also
Hindush satrapy
References
1. ^ On the basis of the dating of the Bisotun (q.v.) inscription, such conquests can be dated to around 518 BC
(Vogelsang, 1987, pp. 187-88; Briant, 1996, p. 153)
2. ^ (Fussman, 1993, p. 84). This is inferred from the fact that Gandhara (OPers. Gandra) is already mentioned at
Bisotun, while the toponym Hindu (Sindh) is added only in later inscriptions.
3. ^ Marshall, John (1975) [1951]. Taxila: Volume I. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass. pp. 83.
4. ^ The inscription on Darius' tomb at Naqsh-i-Rustam near Persepolis records GADRA (Gandra) along with
HINDUSH (Hndu, Sindh) in the list of satrapies.
5. ^ The hypothesis that the region had already become independent by the end of the reign of Darius I or during the
reign of Artaxerxes II (Chattopadhyaya, 1974, pp. 25-26) appears to be contradicted by Ctesiass reference to gifts
received from the kings of India and by the fact that even Darius III still had some Indian units in his army (Briant,
1996, pp. 699, 774). At the time of the arrival of the Alexander's Macedonian army in Indus Valley, there is no
mention of officers of the Persian kings in India; but this does not mean (Dittmann, 1984, p. 185) that the
Achaemenids had no power there. Other data indicate that they still exercised control over the area, although in
ways that differed from those of Darius Is time (Briant, 1996, pp. 776-78).
External links
Ancient India, A History Textbook for Class XI, Ram Sharan Sharma, National Council of Educational
Research and Training, India Iranian and Macedonian Invasion, pp 108
INDIA iii. RELATIONS: ACHAEMENID PERIOD (http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/india-iii-
relations-achaemenid-period)
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