The Shulgara Valley, Bactra & Chashma-i-Shafa

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"The Shulgara Valley is next to Chashma-i-Shafa and is located near Balkh, Afghanistan......Location of Bactra and Zariaspa?.....Recent research by David Adams (an experienced Australian documentary maker and photo-journalist) and his research team suggests that Bactra and Zariaspa are not synonymous with Balkh but are located further south in the Shulgara Valley in the Paraopamisus mountain range. This was presented in Episode 2 - The Mother of All Cities in his series Alexander's Lost World. The location proposed is backed by circumstantial evidence including consistency with contemporary accounts (the site of modern Balkh is not) and the presence of archaeological ruins which are consistent with contemporary accounts; the ruins are the subject of a French archaelogical dig. According to Adams, contemporary Greek accounts describe Bactra and Zariaspa as twin cities and 'that the two cities lay at the foot of the Paraopamisus mountains and the Bactra river flowed past their walls.".........https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk%3ABalkh

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"Cheshmeh-ye Shafa is a village in Balkh Province in northern Afghanistan.....On October 2008, French archaeologists believed they have found a vast ancient city of Bactria......Coordinates: 36°32′0″N 66°58′0″E....Perched high above an important pass between Central Asia and the road to India, the fortifications of Cheshm-e Shafa were a crucial stronghold for a succession of empires for more than 1,500 years beginning in the 5th century B.C."...Edge of an Empire....October 2011 by Andrew Lawler

Click on the map to enlarge......https://www.google.com/maps/place/Chashma-i-Shafa

"Cheshm-e-Shafa.......In the spring of 2008 French and Afghan archaeologists announced that they had uncovered the ruins of a vast, hither-to unknown, ancient city at Cheshm-e-Shafa, the 'City of Infidels' (Unbelievers), some 20 miles (30 kilometres) from the ruins of Balkh fortress..... this was once an important Zoroastrian city. The dig team have uncovered a 6-foot-tall (2-meter-tall) anvil-like stone believed to have been an altar at a fire temple dating back to around the 6th century BC. "....http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/balkh/balkh2.htm

"Balkhab River in Shulgara........The picture with the title 'Shulgara River' banks was taken by the photographer Mike1971 on 11 June 2011 and published over Panoramio. Shulgara River banks is next to Qizil Kand and is located in Balkh, Afghanistan....Photo taken in Chimtal, Afghanistan".....http://www.panoramio.com/photo/54055792

"The Achaemenid palace in Bactra (modern Balkh in N-Afghanistan) has been discovered. This is the place where Alexander spent the winter of 329/328 BC, and where Bessus was sentenced to death (and probably crucified); it may have been the place where Alexander married Roxane in 327 BC. .....http://forum.alexander-the-great.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=1320&sid=b3470178438a68d27a654935e62e2aab

"Marmul in Balkh (region) is a city in Afghanistan - about 175 mi (or 281 km) North-West of Kabul, the country's capital.....Travel warnings are updated daily: This country is marked as DO NOT TRAVEL.....

"Chashma-i-Shafa is in Afghanistan, situated near Rubāţ-e Bālā.....Variant forms of spelling for Rubāţ-e Bālā or in other languages: Rubāţ-e Bālā, رباطِ بالا, Robāţ-e Bālā, Robat-e Bala, Robāţ-e Bālā, Rubat-e Bala, Rubāţ-e Bālā, rbati bala, رباطِ بالا.

"A Korean construction firm is constructing a highway that happens over the archaeological place.....French archaeologists who work there have put themselves in front of the machines to prevent the place from being destroyed."...http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/5685992/Ancient-settlement-could-be-bulldozed.html)

"An ancient city of what is now northern Afghanistan. Bactra/Zariaspa (modern Balkh?) was a center of Zoroastrianism.
Names:
Bactra (550 BC - AD 300)
Baktra (330 BC - AD 226)
Balḫ (2000 BC - AD 2000)
Balḫ (2000 BC - AD 2000)
Baḫl (AD 300 - AD 640)
Bāxtri (540 BC - 330 BC)
Bāḫtri (540 BC - 330 BC)
Lan-shih (30 BC - AD 226)
Zaraspadum (30 BC - AD 300)
Zariaspa (330 BC - AD 300)
Zariaspa (540 BC - 140 BC)
...http://pleiades.stoa.org/places/961886

"CHESHM-E-SHAFA, Afghanistan — Centuries-old shards of pottery mingle with spent ammunition rounds on a wind-swept mountainside in northern Afghanistan where French archaeologists believe they have found a vast ancient city. For years, villagers have dug the baked earth on the heights of Cheshm-e-Shafa for pottery and coins to sell to antique smugglers. Tracts of the site that locals call the "City of Infidels" look like a battleground, scarred by craters......But now tribesmen dig angular trenches and preserve fragile walls, working as laborers on an excavation atop a promontory. To the north and east lies an undulating landscape of barren red-tinted rock that was once the ancient kingdom of Bactria; to the south a still-verdant valley that leads to the famed Buddhist ruins at Bamiyan.....Roland Besenval, director of the French Archaeological Delegation in Afghanistan and leading the excavation, is sanguine about his helpers' previous harvesting of the site. "Generally the old looters make the best diggers," he said with a shrug.....A trip around the northern province of Balkh is like an odyssey through the centuries, spanning the ancient Persian empire, the conquests of Alexander the Great and the arrival of Islam. The French mission has mapped some 135 sites of archaeological interest in the region, best known for the ancient trove found by a Soviet archaeologist in the 1970s......The Bactrian Hoard consisted of exquisite gold jewelry and ornaments from graves of wealthy nomads, dated to the 1st century A.D. It was concealed by its keepers in the vaults of the presidential palace in Kabul from the Taliban regime and finally unlocked after the militia's ouster.....The treasure, currently on exhibition in the United States, demonstrates the rich culture that once thrived here, blending influences from the web of trails and trading routes known as the Silk Road, that spread from Rome and Greece to the Far East and India.".....http://www.nbcnews.com/id/26095077/ns/technology_and_science-science/t/ancient-city-uncovered-afghanistan/#.VmQ0z-MrKRs

"The Old Iranian name of Paktra, which the classical writers named it Bactria and their language was known as Bactrian, and after invasion of Iran by Arabs in 7th century CE it has come to be called Balkh;.....Not much has been known about this empire, only some coins and a little bit of writing and occasional archaeological artifacts. Much of the work on excavations of Bactrian artifacts has been done by French Archaeologists. Historians find remote references in other people's records about the kingdom.....It was from Bactria that came prophet Zarathushtra (Zartosht/Zardosht). Another source of spiritual home that made Bactria sacred was a great temple of the ancient Iranian goddess, Anahit (in Pahlavi or Middle-Persian) and Anahita (Ânâhitâ) in the Avesta hymns.......The temple was so rich that often it attracted the needy Syrian kings who sat out to plunder it. In her name and honor, in Armenia, girls prostituted themselves. Anaitis was a Scythian goddess, but she is identified also as Assyrian Mylitta, the Arabian Alytta and the Greek Venus Urania. Artaxerxes Mnemon, one of the emperors of Achaemenid dynasty was among her devotees. She is also associated with the Persian Mithra. Her association with Zoroaster adds to her popularity......Bactria, by some writers, is called "the pride of Ariana". The ancient local citizen called it "Bactria the beautiful". Bactria was popular for its fertility. Besides Oxus, the Arius [modern Hari-rud] and a few other smaller river irrigate it. A large variety of fruits and vegetables grows here and excellent breed of sheep were raised in green Hindu Kush slopes. Bacteria is also known for its camels......However, the most popular of the Bactrian animals is the Bactrian horse. This animal played a partial role in the reputation of Bactrian cavalry in the ancient world......The once well watered land of Bactria and its fair climate has generally changed. The courses of the rivers have shifted, thus Bactria is not as glorious as it had been during the Macedonian occupation. The river Oxus once poured into the Caspian Sea, but now it flows into the Aral Sea. The modern city of Balkh [the old Bactrus], stood on the banks of this river, but now the city is a few miles away from the mighty Oxus.......Another feature of Bactria was the succession of mighty natural forts (Kalas) spread over the country, asserting to the traveler the safety and excellent strategical position of the city.".......http://www.iranchamber.com/geography/articles/balkh.php#sthash.wcCpbkoU.dpuf

"The Aryans and the Iranians of Bactria, had a lot in common. They spoke the same language, worshiped the forces of nature, such as: Varuna, the shining Vault of Heaven; Mithra, the friendly light of the sun; Vayu; the wind that pushes aside the storms and clears the heaven; Yama, the primeval man, reigning over the blessed souls in paradise. The powers of nature, to them, were the signs of something far more deeply interfused. In their ceremonies they also drunk the sacred Juice, Soma. These two races slowly drifted apart as time went on, for not known reasons.".....http://www.iranchamber.com/geography/articles/balkh.php#sthash.wcCpbkoU.dpuf

"It is probably Zarathushtra who changes the religion of the Iranians from the old Aryan to the Zarathushtrian. By this time, the language also changed. Iranians held the fire sacred and stopped burning their dead, instead they exposed the dead to the birds. Out of the old religion came new practices, for example, holding some animals sacred....Also minute rituals were created around new practices. Lastly, the existence of a dualism in Nature appeared. They explained Evil as the work of the lord of the Hosts of Daeva...... The legend is that Zarathushtra appeared during the reign of Gushtaspa at "Bactra the beautiful, city of the high - streaming banner". Zarathushtra's wife's family were very influential in the Royal court, that helped Zarathushtra spread his religion. Hence, Bactria became the heart of the new creed. According to Ferdowsi. Zarathushtra was killed by an invading Scythian party in front of his fire-altar, in Balkh".......http://www.iranchamber.com/geography/articles/balkh.php#sthash.wcCpbkoU.dpuf

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

December 2015

John Hopkins....Northern New Mexico

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Iranian, Persian, Parsa, Persia & Iran: Distinctions

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"The name 'Persia' comes from 'Pers' which is in turn the European version of 'Pars' - an area that is today a province of Iran. .....2,500 years ago, when the present provinces of Iran were kingdoms [at one time Iran (then Airan) consisted of 240 kingdoms], Pars was known as Parsa, and the kings of Parsa established an empire that came to be known in the West as the Persian Empire - the largest empire the world have ever known to that point. In those days, Parsa was the dominant kingdom of all the Iranian or Aryan kingdoms."...http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

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"According to the Kār-nāmag..........Middle Persian 'Book of the Deeds of Ardashir'....... "there were in the territory of Iran two hundred and forty princes" at the beginning of Iranian Parthian Empire (247 BC – 228 AD) .....The dominant kingdom of Iran has at various times been Balkh (Bactria), Mada (Media), Parsa (Persia), Parthava (Parthia) and then Persia again. The king of the dominant kingdom was called king-of-kings (shah-en-shah in modern terms) - an emperor.".......http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

...."King of Kings" (šar šarrāni) .....The Persian title of a king of kings is shahanshah....associated especially with Zoroastrian Persian Achaemenid Empire......the terms used for Hindu kings to represent king of kings include Rajadhi raja , chakravarthi, Maharaja ,Perarasu,etc.......In the Pali Tripitaka, Buddha is sometimes compared to the worldly Emperor (Chakravarti), the Universal King, or the secular "King of Kings". But Buddha is also seen as the "King of the Dharma" or Dharma-raja......The first written record of its consistent use dates to Iranian Kings of the Persian Empire or Iranian High Kings of the Persian Empire (pronounced Shahanshah or Great Shahanshah). Because the Persian kings ruled in a format where conquered kings were allowed to rule over provinces (Satraps), while being loyal to the King of kings of the Persian Empire, the fact that the Persian kings ruled over other kings gave them the title king of kings......

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"...'Iran' is a relatively modern contraction of the name Airyana Vaeja (the ancient homeland of the Airya or Aryans).....Over time, Airyana Vaeja became Airan-Vej, then Eran-Vej or Airan-Vej ...... then Eran or Airan, and finally Iran......While we do not know the precise location of the originl Aryan homeland, Airyana Vaeja, the Central Asian lands that are today part of Tajikistan, north-eastern Afghanistan, and southern Uzbekistan - all east of the northeast corner of present day Iran - are strong candidates....From Airyana Vaeja the original Aryan homeland (possibly quite small in size and extent), the Aryans migrated to surrounding lands. In doing so, they formed fifteen additional kingdoms listed in the Avesta, the Zoroastrian scriptures, in a book called the Vendidad.....the migrations extended along the Aryan Trade Roads known commonly as the Silk Roads.".....http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

"During the reign of the subsequent Kayanian dynasty (Zarathushtra lived during the reign of Kayanian King Vishtasp) which assumed dominance over the Aryan nations, the Shahnameh no longer has the capital of Greater Iran located near Sari, but rather in Balkh (Bactria), in the north of Afghanistan today....Ancient Airyana Vaeja grew to become a federation of nations that classical Greek historian and geographer Strabo called Aryana/Ariana (Avestan Airyana). Strabo describes the different kingdoms/nations that constituted Aryana describing its borders as stretching from the Indus to Persia-Media - linked, as he noted, by a common language native to the groups...."........http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

"Balkh / Bactria & King Vishtasp.....The fourth Vendidad nation is Bakhdhim / Bakhdhi / Bakhdi / Balkh located in Northern Afghanistan. Among the first "hearers and teachers" of Zarathushtra's message listed in the Farvardin Yasht (13.99) was King Vishtasp. Later texts state that King Vishtasp, a king of the Kayanian dynasty, was king of Bakhdhi/Balkh, and that Zarathushtra died in Bakhdhi/Balkh, killed by a Turanian. In these texts, the Amu Darya (Oxus) river formed the north-eastern border between ancient Bakhdhi and Turan (Sugd). Further upstream, a portion of the Amu Darya river ran through Bakhdhi. .....Balkh became the capital city of the Kayanian kings and ancient Airan, the successor state to Airyana Vaeja and the predecessor state to modern Iran.".... http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/aryans/location.htm

"Persian Rise to Dominance Over the Aryan Nations......About 2,500 years ago, the Parsa (Persians) rose to power to became the dominant Aryan kingdom. Dominance amongst the Aryans groups passed from the Medes to the Parsa (Persians) when the Achaemenian king Cyrus the Great (Cyrus II) established the Persian Empire in the sixth century BC by bringing the nations within the Aryan Empire ruled by the Medes under overall Persian rule. The dominance of the Aryan federation of nations had passed from Feridoon's dynasty (in Gorgan-Mazandaran, i.e. central-north Aryana) to the Kayanians (in Balkh i.e. mid-eastern Aryana) to the Medes (in north-west Aryana) and now to the Persians (in south-western Aryana).".......http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

"The West, influenced as it was by Greek and Latin literature, continued to call Eran 'Persia', presumably out of habit or because the rulers of Iran were Persians. That Western tradition continued into the last century until the reign of Iranian king, Reza Shah, founder of the Pahlavi dynasty. In 1935 AD, Reza Shah asked those countries with whom Iran had diplomatic relations, to stop using the name Persia and to formally refer to his country as Iran. Some Euro-centric map-makers and authors ignored this formal request and continued to use Persia as the name instead of Iran."..........http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

"In the 7th century AD, the Arabs conquered Iran and converted the mainly Zoroastrian population to Islam. The Arabs pronounced the name Pars as Fars (because Arabic does not have the 'p' sound).....While the words Parsi and Farsi are synonymous, today the Arabized name Farsi is used to mean the Persian language. The initial wave of Zoroastrian refugees who fled to India after the Arab invasion of Iran, now use of the authentic name 'Parsi' as their ethnic group name. ".............http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

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"The Vendidad.....Today, there is controversy over historical development of the Vendidad. The Vendidad is classified by some as an artificial, young Avestan text. Its language resembles Old Avestan. The Vendidad is thought to be a Magi (Magi-influenced) composition......The Vendidad consists of 22 fargards containing fragments of discussions between Ahura Mazda and Zoroaster.......some consider the Vendidad a link to ancient early oral traditions, began - perhaps substantially - before the formation of the Median and Persian Empires, before the 8th century B.C.....The name of the texts is a contraction of the Avestan language Vî-Daêvô-Dāta, "Given Against the Daevas (Demons)", and as the name suggests, the Vendidad is an enumeration of various manifestations of evil spirits, and ways to confound them." ....Kellens, Jean (1989). "Avesta". Encyclopedia Iranica

"Daeva (daēuua, daāua, daēva) is an Avestan language term for a particular sort of supernatural entity with disagreeable characteristics. In the Gathas, the oldest texts of the Zoroastrian canon, the daevas are "wrong gods" or "false gods" or "gods that are (to be) rejected.......Daeva, the Iranian language term, should not be confused with the devas of Indian religions. While the word for the Vedic spirits and the word for the Zoroastrian entities are etymologically related, their function and thematic development is altogether different. The once-widespread notion that the radically different functions of Iranian daeva and Indic deva (and ahura versus asura) represented a prehistoric inversion of roles is no longer followed in 21st century academic discourse....In the Rigveda (10.124.3), the devas are the "younger gods", in conflict with the asuras, the "older gods". There is no such division evident in the Zoroastrian texts....Old Avestan daēuua or daēva derives from Old Iranian *daiva, which in turn derives from Indo-Iranian *daivá- "god," reflecting Proto-Indo-European *deiu̯ó with the same meaning.".....https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daeva

"Kār-nāmag........KĀR-NĀMAG Ī ARDAŠĪR Ī PĀBAGĀN, a short prose work written in Middle Persian... written in the Sassanid period (226-651 AD)...... It narrates the Sasanian king Ardašīr I’s own life story—his rise to the throne, battle against the Parthian king Ardawān, and conquest of the empire by the scion of the House of Sāsān, as well as episodes concerning his heir Šābuhr and the latter’s son, Ohrmazd. .....http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/karnamag-i-ardasir

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

December 2015

John Hopkins....Northern New Mexico

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King Gondophares & the St Thomas Legend (52 AD)

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King Gondophares ....."The Acts of Thomas (Ch. 17) describes Saint Thomas' visit to King Gondophares .....When Acts was being composed, there was no reason to suppose that a king named "Gondophares" had ever really existed. However, the discovery of his coins in the region of Kabul and the Punjab, and the finding of a votive inscription of his 26th regal year that was unknown until 1872, provided evidence that his reign commenced in 21 C.E. until c. 47 C.E.".....http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org

"Saint Thomas the Apostle (also known as Judas Thomas or Didymus, meaning "Twin") ......Thomas was said to have taken Christianity eastwards as far as India. The churches of Malankara in India trace their roots back to St. Thomas who, according to local tradition, arrived along the Malabar Coast in the year 52 AD....."

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"The reign of one king calling himself Gondophares has been established at 20 AD by the rock inscription he set up at Takht-i Bahi (also known as Takht Bahi) in Mardan, western Pakistan, in 46 AD., and he has also been connected with the third-century Acts of Thomas. Recent research has however shown unambiguously that "Gondophares" was a title held by many kings.....Takht Bhai (or Takht Bahi) is a Parthian archaeological site in Mardan, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. It was first a Zoroastrian complex which, after the later arrival of Buddhism, was then converted into a Buddhist monastic complex. It is dated to the 1st century BC."

"Takht Bhai is a Parthian archaeological site in Mardan, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. It was first a Zoroastrian complex which, after the later arrival of Buddhism, was then converted into a Buddhist monastic complex. It is dated to the 1st century BC.....The Takht Bahi complex includes The Tantric monastic complex, which consists of small, dark cells with low openings, which may have been used for certain forms of Tantric meditation, which took place in the 6th and 7th Centuries AD, and was overseen by invading Hun rulers......Nearby are the ruins of Sahr-i-Bahlol, a small fortified city dating from the same period.....Sahr-i-Bahlol, is located approximately 5 km away in a fertile plain. The Sahr-i-Bahlol ruins are the remnants of a small ancient fortified town of the Kushan period. ....The Buddhist monastery was in continual use until the 7th century AD.....Due to the location of on the Buddhist Ruins of Takht-i-Bahi on high hills, it escaped successive invasions and is exceptionally well preserved.....

In this Greek-Kharoshthi tetrodrachm coin Gondophares honors Shiva.....Indo Parthian Kings Gondophares AE Tetradrachm. Date: 30-50 AD. Obverse: King on horseback right. Reverse: Siva facing holding trident.

In another Greek-Kharoshthi tetradrachm, Gondophares honors Zeus...."Indo Parthian, Gondophares: AD 30-55, AE Tetradrachm, 24mm. King on horseback right / Zeus walking right."

"King Gondophares I took over the Kabul valley and the Punjab and Sindh region area from the Scythian King Azes.....Gondophares declared independence from the Arsacids (aka: Parthian Empire) to become the first Indo-Parthian king ....His empire was vast, but was only a loose framework, which fragmented soon after his death. His capital was the Gandharan city of Taxila, to the west of the present Islamabad. Ernst Herzfeld claims his name is perpetuated in the name of the Afghan city Kandahar, which he founded under the name Gundopharron....Ancient Taxila was situated at the pivotal junction of South Asia and Central Asia. Some of the earliest ruins in this area date to the time of the Achaemenid Empire in the 6th c. BC."......Ernst Herzfeld, Archaeological History of Iran, London, Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 1935, p.63.

"The Saint Thomas Christians refer to themselves in this way because their tradition holds that their ancestors, who all came from the high castes of Hindu society, were converted by the Apostle Saint Thomas, who landed in India in the year 52 AD. At present there is no way to scientifically prove or disprove this tradition. One thing is certain: ever since the discovery of the monsoon winds in 45 AD by Hippalos, an Alexandrian ship-captain, the land and sea routes were open from the Mediterranean via the Persian Gulf to India, and there were indeed intense contacts between these areas. One after the other, Roman coins of the first century AD are being unearthed in southern India.".....Project for Preserving the Manuscripts of the Syrian Christians in India

"Azes I (57 BC – c. 35 BC)...... an Indo-Scythian ruler who completed the domination of the Scythians in Gandhara.....Indo-Scythians is a term used to refer to Scythians (Sakas), who migrated into parts of central and northern South Asia (Sogdiana, Bactria, Arachosia, Gandhara, Sindh, Kashmir, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, UP and Bihar.), from the middle of the 2nd century BC to the 4th century AD..... It is believed that the Greek era may have begun in 173 BC, exactly 300 years before the first year of the Era of Kanishka. If that is the case then the Azes era would begin in about 45 BC."....Bracey, R. (2005) 'The Azes Era'

"The Buddhist monastery Takht-i-Bhai (Throne of Origins) is an archaeological wonder, considered to be significant because of its unique design. "The site is extremely important for its integrity and unique state of conservation; important also for its antiquity, being built certainly during the 1st century CE, as proven by the important inscriptions bearing the name of Gondophares (20-46 CE)," says the Director of the Italian Archaeological Mission in Pakistan, Dr Luca Maria Olivieri......He says Gondophares was a Parthian King of the Suren House, from Sakastan, or Sistan...."Soon after Gondophares, Takht-i-Bahi was under the control of Kujula Kadphises, the first Kushan King. The site remained in use certainly until Late Antiquity (7th CE).....the site is a symbol of architectural complexity of a Buddhist monastic complex, and it should be considered a wonderful introduction to Gandharan Buddhist architecture, a must stop for tourist heading towards Swat.".....http://www.sundayobserver.lk/2015/06/14/spe-her-01.asp

"The early 3rd-century text called Acts of Thomas is one of the New Testament apocrypha......Acts of Thomas is a series of episodic Acts (Latin passio) that occurred during the evangelistic mission of Judas Thomas ("Judas the Twin") to India......Though Gregory of Tours made a version, mainstream Christian tradition rejects the Acts of Thomas as pseudepigraphical and apocryphal, and for its part, the Roman Catholic Church finally confirmed the Acts as heretical at the Council of Trent. ....The Acts of Thomas connects Thomas, the apostle's Indian ministry with two kings, one in the north and the other in the south. According to one of the legends in the Acts, Thomas was forced to accompany an Indian merchant, Abbanes, to his native place in northwest India, where he found himself in the service of the Indo-Parthian king Gondophares."

" Song Yun, a Chinese pilgrim.....was a Chinese Buddhist monk who was sent by the devout Buddhist Empress Hu (胡, ?-528 CE) of the Northern Wei Dynasty with some companions including the monk Hui Zheng, Fa Li and Zheng (or Wang) Fouze, to northwestern India to search for Buddhist texts.....They left the Wei capital Luoyang, on foot in 518 and returned in the winter of 522 with 170 Mahayana Buddhist texts....Song Yun and his companions then travelled through Chitral and met the kings of the Swat Valley or Udyana..... Song Yun: Takht-i-Bhai & Sahr-i-Bahlol ... From the description of Song Yun, a Chinese pilgrim, it appears that it was on one of the four great cities lying along the important commercial route to India."

"The Hephthalite Huns captured Gandhara around 451, and did not adopt Buddhism, but in fact "perpetrated frightful massacres". Mihirakula became a "terrible persecutor" of the religion.....During their rule, Hinduism revived itself and the Buddhist Gandharan civilization declined. The Sassanids, aided by Turks from Central Asia, destroyed the Huns' power base in Central Asia, and Gandhara once again came under Persian suzerainty in 568......The travel records of many Chinese Buddhists pilgrims record that Gandhara was going through a transformation during these centuries. Buddhism was declining and Hinduism was rising. Fa-Xian travelled around 400, when Prakrit was the language of the people and Buddhism was flourishing. 100 years later, when Song-Yun visited in 520, a different picture was described: the area had been destroyed by the White Huns and was ruled by Lae-Lih, who did not practice the laws of the Buddha. After the fall of the Sassanid Empire to the Arabs in 644, today's Afghanistan region and Gandhara came under pressure from Muslims. But they failed to extend their empire to Gandhara. Gandhara was first ruled from Kabul and then from Udabhandapura (Hind).....Gandhara was ruled from Kabul by Kabulshahi for next 200 years. Sometime in the 9th century the Kabulshahi replaced the shahi. Based on various Muslim records the estimated date for this is 870. According to Al-Biruni (973–1048), Kallar, a Brahmin minister of the Kabulshahi, founded the Shahi dynasty in 843. The dynasty ruled from Kabul, later moved their capital to Udabhandapura. They built great temples all over their kingdoms."

"The tomb of St. Thomas the Apostle in Mylapore, India.....According to tradition, St. Thomas was killed at Mylapore, near Chennai, in 72 and his body was interred there....A few relics are still kept at San Thome Basilica in Mylapore, India. Marco Polo, the Venetian traveller and author of Description of the World, popularly known as Il Milione, is reputed to have visited Southern India in 1288 and 1292. "

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

October 2015

John Hopkins....Northern New Mexico

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Darius the Great and the Kabul River (515 BC)

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Achaemenid Provinces during the rule of Darius the Great ..... third Achaemenid king of kings (r. 522-October 486 B.C.)......Darius sent a naval reconnaissance mission down the Kabul river (aka Sita) to the Indus.....http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/darius-iii

"Darius I (c. 550–486 BCE) was the third king of the Persian Achaemenid Empire. Also called Darius the Great, he ruled the empire at its peak, when it included much of West Asia, the Caucasus, parts of the Balkans (Thrace-Macedonia and Paeonia), most of the Black Sea coastal regions, parts of the North Caucasus, Central Asia, as far as the Indus Valley in the far east, and portions of north and northeast Africa including Egypt (Mudrâya), eastern Libya and coastal Sudan."

"Darius himself marched against “the rebellious Scythians” of Central Asia, who threatened the northern and eastern flanks of the empire; he crossed the Caspian Sea, defeated the group known as the Pointed-Hat Scythians (Sakā tigraxaudā), captured their “king,” Skunxa, and installed a loyal leader in his stead (DB 5.20-33; for detailed commentary, see Shahbazi, 1982, pp. 189-96). On his return he added the image of Skunxa and an account of the Elamite and Scythian campaigns to the reliefs at Bīsotūn. In autumn 517 he traveled to Egypt and succeeded in pacifying the rebellious Egyptians by showing respect for their religion and past glory and by ordering the codification of their laws; in turn he received their obeisance and reverence (Polyaenus, Strategemata 7.11.7; Diodorus, 1.95.4-5; for details, see Bresciani, pp. 507-09; Ray, pp. 262-64). After he returned to Persia Darius executed Intaphernes for treason (Herodotus, 3.118-19) and sent a naval reconnaissance mission down the Kabul river to the Indus; it explored the eastern borderlands, Sind, the Indian Ocean, and the Red Sea and arrived in Egypt near modern Suez thirty months later (Hinz, 1976, p. 198; Bivar, CAH2, pp. 202-04). Following this expedition “Darius conquered the Indians [of Sind], and made use of the sea in those parts” (Herodotus, 4.44)."......http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/darius-iii

"The Father of History, Herodotus of Halicarnassus refers to Scylax and his expedition in book 4, section 44........The greater part of Asia the greater part was explored by [the Persian king] Darius, who desired to know more about the river Indus, which is one of the two rivers in the world to produce crocodiles. He wanted to know where this river runs out into the sea, and sent with his ships [...] Scylax, a man of Caryanda.......They started from the city of Caspatyrus in the land of Pactyïke, sailed down the river towards the east and to the sea. Sailing westwards over the sea, they came in the thirtieth month to the place from whence the king of the Egyptians had sent out the Phoenicians of whom I spoke before [text], to sail round Africa.......Pactyïke was a part of ancient Gandara (eastern Afghanistan) and Caspatyrus, which is not mentioned in other sources, has to be somewhere along the river Kabul. Since Herodotus tells us in the next line that Scylax' expedition was a preliminary to Darius' conquest of the Indus valley, we can date this voyage after 519 -when Darius' rule was secure- and before 512, when India seems to have been part of the Persian empire......Scylax' voyage led him along the Indus, along the shores of the Indian ocean and those of the Persian gulf. We do not know the details of this expedition, but we have a later source, the Indikê by Arrian of Nicomedia, which contains an excerpt of the story of Nearchus, the admiral of Alexander the Great. He made the same voyage and mentions the tides, whales and the hard living conditions along the Gedrosian coast.".......http://www.livius.org/articles/person/scylax-of-caryanda/

"Western India was part of the Persian Empire during the reign of Darius the First, so almost certainly the answer is yes. He tried to develop the commerce of the empire, and sent an expedition down the Kabul and the Indus, led by the Carian captain Scylax of Caryanda, who explored the Indian Ocean from the mouth of the Indus to Suez.".....http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Darius_I_of_Persia#The_empire_under_Darius

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"Kabul River aka: Sita River..........In 672 an Arab governor of Sistan, Abbad ibn Ziyad, raided the frontier of Al-Hind and crossed the desert to Gandhara, but quickly retreated again. The marauder Obaidallah crossed the Sita River and made a raid on Kabul in 698 only to meet with defeat and humiliation. Vincent Smith, in Early History of India, states that the Turkishahiya dynasty continued to rule over Kabul and Gandhara up until the advent of the Saffarids in the ninth century. Forced by the inevitable advance of Islam on the west, they then moved their capital from Kapisa to Wahund on the Indus, whence they contin­ued as the Hindushahiya dynasty. This was in 870 A.D. and marks the first time that the Kingdom of Shambhala actually came under Moslem domination. The Hindushahis recaptured Kabul and the rest of their Kingdom after the death of the conqueror Yaqub but never again maintained Kapisa as their capital."......http://www.dharmafellowship.org/biographies/historicalsaints/lord-padmasambhava.htm#eightcentury

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"After he returned to Persia Darius executed Intaphernes for treason (Herodotus, 3.118-19) and sent a naval reconnaissance mission down the Kabul river to the Indus; it explored the eastern borderlands, Sind, the Indian Ocean, and the Red Sea and arrived in Egypt near modern Suez thirty months later (Hinz, 1976, p. 198; Bivar, CAH2, pp. 202-04). Following this expedition "Darius conquered the Indians [of Sind], and made use of the sea in those parts" (Herodotus, 4.44).".......http://www.cais-soas.com/CAIS/History/hakhamaneshian/darius_great.htm

"The Achaemenian records and Herodotus suggest that Massagetae and Haumavarga were one and the same and they inhabited the present-day region east of the Caspian Sea and west of the Aral Sea. This area that presently is watered by Gorganrud and Atrak in the south and the Oxus and Jaxartes in the north had a different look in the views of the ancient geographers. The Oxus and Jaxartes were deemed to empty into the Caspian Sea, thereby creating a milieu consisting of plains intersected by various rivers closer to the Iranian heartland.".....Atlas of Ancient and Classical Geography (London: J.M. Dent & Sons, 1950), pp. 2-5.....http://www.romanianhistoryandculture.com/dariusiinthracia.htm

"Scylax of Caryanda was a renowned Greek explorer and writer of the late 6th and early 5th centuries BC. His own writings are lost, though occasionally cited or quoted by later Greek and Roman authors...In about 515 BCE, Scylax was sent by King Darius I of Persia to follow the course of the Indus River and discover where it led.....Scylax and his companions set out from the city of Caspatyrus in Gandhara (which would mean he entered the Indus close to its confluence with the Kabul River, near to what is now Peshawar in Pakistan). Scylax sailed down the river until he found it reached the sea. He then sailed west across the Indian Ocean until he arrived at the Red Sea, which he also explored. He travelled as far as the Red Sea's western end at Suez, before returning to report to Darius I. His entire journey took thirty months.. ".....Lendering, Jona "Scylax of Caryanda".

"Skylaks of Karyanda (Greek: Σκύλαξ; Latin and English: Scylax) was a famous explorer and writer from Karyanda in Karia in the late 500's and early 400 BC His own writings have been lost, but has been occasionally quoted or mentioned by later Greek and Roman writers. He was in the Persian service, sailed down Kabul, made ​​a reconnaissance along the coast of the Indian Ocean until the Red Sea of 13 months around the time 515 BC ......The periplous ("Circumnavigation") which is preserved under his name, however, is not of him, but one geographic study (rather than a travel description) which was written early in 330 BC by an unknown author who worked in or by Aristotle 'peripatetic school in Athens. This work is known as the Periplus of Pseudo-Skylaks. "......https://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skylaks

"The Kabul River (Persian/Urdu: دریای کابل‎; Pashto: کابل سیند‎, Sanskrit: कुभा ), the classical Cophes /ˈkoʊfiːz/, is a 700-kilometre (430 mi) long river that starts in the Sanglakh Range of the Hindu Kush mountains in Afghanistan and ends in the Indus River near Attock, Pakistan. It is the main river in eastern Afghanistan and is separated from the watershed of the Helmand by the Unai Pass. The Kabul River passes through the cities of Kabul and Jalalabad in Afghanistan before flowing into Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in Pakistan some 25 kilometres (16 mi) north of the Durand Line border crossing at Torkham. The major tributaries of the Kabul River are the Logar, Panjshir, Kunar, Alingar, Bara and Swat rivers.....The Kabul River is little more than a trickle for most of the year, but swells in summer due to melting snows in the Hindu Kush Range. Its largest tributary is the Kunar River, which starts out as the Mastuj River, flowing from the Chiantar glacier in Chitral, Pakistan and after flowing south into Afghanistan it is met by the Bashgal river flowing from Nurestan. The Kunar meets the Kabul near Jalalabad. In spite of the Kunar carrying more water than the Kabul, the river continues as the Kabul River after this confluence, mainly for the political and historical significance of the name."

"John Wood (1812 – 14 November 1871) was a Scottish naval officer, surveyor, cartographer and explorer, principally remembered for his exploration of central Asia.....Many of the maps of southern Asia which he compiled remained standard for the rest of the 19th century......In 1835, aged twenty-two, he commanded the first steamboat to paddle up the Indus River and surveyed the river as he went. Four years later, he led an expedition that found one of the River Oxus' sources in central Asia. The Royal Geographical Society recognised his work by awarding him their Patron's Medal in 1841.....John Wood..... A Narrative of a Journey to the Source of the River Oxus, London: John Murray, 1841.

Natural Mind Meditation.......Page 275......By Rodney Devenish

"Within the territory of Olmo Lung-ring..... there are eight great rivers in different directions and in the valleys along these rivers the peoples speak different languages and dialects. Whereas the language in the inner lands is that of the Swastika Gods, here in the twelve middle lands the people mainly speak and write the eight transformed languages (bsgyur-ba'i skad), each of which is associated with one of the eight great rivers as follows: 1. "gTsang-ma lha skad" along the Na-ra-dza-ra river in the east, 2. "Dag-pa lha skad" along the Pakshu river in the the north, 3. "Samskri lha skad" (i.e., Sanskrit) along the Ma-shang river in the west, 4. "Khri-wer lha skad" along the Sindhu river in the south, 5. "Hor ci 'phrul skad" along the Ganga river in the south east, 6. "sPos ci 'phrul skad" along the SITA river in the southwest, 7. "Ci gung 'phrul skad" along the Seng-ga river in the northwest, and 8. "Cung tshe 'phrul skad" along the Serdan (gser-ldan) river in the northeast. .....http://www.surajamrita.com/bon/Shambala.html

"Panchenko, D. V., ‘Scylax’ circumnavigation of India and its interpretation in early Greek geography, ethnography and cosmography, I’, Hyperboreus, 4. 2 (1998), 211–42; id., ‘Scylax in Philostratus’ Life of Apollonius of Tyana’, Hyperboreus, 8. 1 (2002), 5–12; id., ‘Scylax’ circumnavigation of India and its interpretation in early Greek geography, ethnography and cosmography, II’, Hyperboreus, 9. 2 (2003), 274–94."

W. Hinz, “Zur Behistun-Inschrift des Dareios,” ZDMG 96, 1942, pp. 326-49.

R. W. Macan, Herodotus. The Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Books II, London, 1895.

Page 188....The Village of Sambala.......A personal narrative of a journey to the source of the river Oxus : by the route of the Indus, Kabul, and Badakhshan, performed under the sanction of the supreme government of India, in the years 1836, 1837, and 1838......by Wood, John, 1811-1871

"The Choaspes (also called Zuastus and Guræus) is a river that rises in the ancient Paropamise range (now the Hindu Kush in Afghanistan), eventually falling into the Indus river near its confluence with the Cophes river (which is usually identified with the Kabul river).......The Kabul River (Persian/Urdu: دریای کابل‎; Pashto: کابل سیند‎, Sanskrit: कुभा ), the classical Cophes /ˈkoʊfiːz/, is a 700-kilometre (430 mi) long river that emerges in the Sanglakh Range of the Hindu Kush mountains in Afghanistan and empties into the Indus River near Attock, Pakistan."

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

September 2015

John Hopkins....Northern New Mexico

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Sogd to Bactria Migration (4500 BC)

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"ARIA, Herat, -also called Heri, and the river which it stands is called Heri-rud. ... According to Ch. Bunsen, the migration from Sogd to Bactria, took place about 5000 BC...When the climate was altered by some vast disturbance of nature, the Arians migrated....Sogdiana in Samarkand......home of the Fire Worshippers......the River Sogd.....The second settlement was in Margiana (Merv)....the River Margus.....Third settlement was Bokhdi (Bactria/Balkh).....Bactria of the lofty banners was the seat of the Empire...The fourth settlement was Nisaya on the upper Oxus...."......Cyclopædia of India and of Eastern and Southern Asia....by Edward Balfour - 1871 - ‎India....https://books.google.com/books?id=i39RAAAAcAAJ

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The homeland of the Aryans, or Aryan lands was called Airyana Vaeja or Airyanam Dakhyunam in the Avesta and Arya Varta in the Vedas.......http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/images/maps/vendidadnations.jpg

"Balk is named Amu-I-Balad.....the mother of cities. It is said to have been built by Kaismurz of Persia. It was conquered by Alexander....Shams are said to worship the Sun (Shams) Pers..."...(Page 139).....Rivers: Amu (A Mu) or River Oxus, Sir or Jaxartes, Kohik or Zar-Afshatn, and the river of Kurshi and Balkh...."....Cyclopædia of India and of Eastern and Southern Asia...by Edward Balfour - 1871 - ‎India

3102 BC - Beginning of Kali Yuga as per the Vedas....Human civilization degenerates spiritually during the Kali Yuga,which is referred to as the Dark Age......Towards the end of this yuga, Kalki will return riding on a white horse .........In the Kalachakra tradition, Kalki is brandishing a brilliant sword in his left hand, eradicating the decadence of Kali Yuga. Lord Kalki will remove the darkness of kali yuga and establish a new yuga (age) called Satya yuga (Age of Truth) on the earth...Lord Kalki will appear in the home of the most eminent brahmana of Shambhala village......"

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"Sogdiana (/ˌsɔːɡdiˈænə, ˌsɒɡ-/) or Sogdia (/ˈsɔːɡdiə, ˈsɒɡ-/; Old Persian: Suguda-; Ancient Greek: Σογδιανή, Sogdianē; Persian: سغد‎ Soġd; Tajik: Суғд, سغد Suġd; Uzbek: Sugʻd; Chinese: 粟特, Mandarin: Sùtè)......the ancient civilization of an Iranian people and a province of the Achaemenid Empire, eighteenth in the list on the Behistun Inscription of Darius the Great (i. 16). Sogdiana is "listed" as the second of the "good lands and countries" that Ahura Mazda created. This region is listed second after Airyanem Vaejah, "homeland of the Aryans", in the Zoroastrian book of Vendidad, indicating the importance of this region from ancient times.......The Sogdian states, although never politically united, were centered on the main city of Samarkand. Sogdiana lay north of Bactria, east of Khwarezm, and southeast of Kangju between the Oxus (Amu Darya) and the Jaxartes (Syr Darya), embracing the fertile valley of the Zeravshan (ancient Polytimetus). ".....https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sogdia

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Achaemenid Provinces during the rule of Darius the Great ..... third Achaemenid king of kings (r. 522-October 486 B.C.)......Darius sent a naval reconnaissance mission down the Kabul river (aka Sita) to the Indus.....http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/darius-iii

"The Iron Gate is a defile between Balkh and Samarkand. It breaks up the mountains which extend from the Hisar range south towards the Amu Darya. In ancient times it was used as the passage between Bactria and Sogdia and was likely of great importance to any power in the region. Its name comes from the belief that an actual gate, reinforced with Iron, stood in the defile. It is located to west from Boysun, Surxondaryo Province."...... Alexey V. Arapov. "Boysun. Masterpieces of Central Asia". Retrieved 2014-03-25. "The Iron Gates were located on the old road in the canyon of Dara-i Buzgala-khana 3 km to northwest from Shurob kishlak."

"The Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex (BMAC, also known as the "Oxus civilization") is the modern archaeological designation for a Bronze Age culture of Central Asia, dated to ca. 2200–1700 BC...About 1800 BC, the walled BMAC centres decreased sharply in size."

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"The early Greek historian Ctesias, c. 400 BC (followed by Diodorus Siculus), alleged that the legendary Assyrian king Ninus (2189 BC) had defeated a Bactrian king named Oxyartes in c. 2140 BC, or some 1000 years before the Trojan War. ( 1194–1184 BC).....Known as Bactra to the ancient Greeks, Balkh is found in northern Afghanistan and is descibed as the 'Mother of Cities' by Arabs. It reached its peak between 2,500 BC and 1,900 BC prior to the rise of the Persian and Median empires. "

"The Avesta's Farvardin Yasht - the five nations mentioned are Airyana Vaeja (called Airyanam Dakhyunam in the Yasht) as well as four neighbouring lands. These four lands neighbouring Airyana Vaeja are Tuirya, Sairima, Saini and Dahi. Since -nam is a usual ending for many Avestan nouns, the nations are also named as Airyanam, Tuiryanam, Dahinam, Sairimanam and Saininam....Kava Vishtasp, Kava being a title of the Kayanian kings of Bakhdhi / Balkh, is mentioned in the Farvardin Yasht....Bakhdi is listed as a nation in the Vendidad but not in the Farvardin Yasht. These later texts also tell us that Zarathushtra died in Bakhdi/Balkh, killed by a Turanian.......Balkh is directly south of Samarkand over an eastern spur of the Pamir mountains. The predecessors of present day Samarkand and Balkh are among the first nations listed in another (and later) book of the Avesta - the Vendidad. ...".....http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/aryans/airyanavaeja.htm

"Migration of the Aryans.....Before the era of legendary King Jamshid, see (Aryan Prehistory and Location of Aryan Homeland), the original Aryan homeland in the Avesta, Airyana Vaeja, could not have been very large. However, starting in the Jamshidi era and continuing up to the establishment of the Achaemenian Persian empire under Darius the Great, the Aryan lands did grow considerably in size.....The Zoroastrian Avesta, the Hindu Vedas and other texts tell us that the Aryans migrated out of Airyana Vaeja and that the lands associated with the Aryans increased in size for the following reasons:
1. An increase in population during the Jamshidi era.
2. Climate change to severe winters and short summers.
3. Trading with neighbouring lands and settlement of significant populations in these lands.
4. Establishment of kingdoms through settlement or conquest. A federation of these kingdoms during the Feridoon Era / Pishdadian dynasty. 5. Inter-Aryan wars. The schism between the Aryan religious groups, the Mazda-Asura worshippers and the deva worshippers...... cf. reign of King Vishtasp and life of Zarathushtra.
6. Establishment of the Persian empire that included the original federation of kingdoms as well as additional lands. "....
http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/aryans/airyanavaeja.htm

"Hara Berezaiti, the Hara Mountains.....The Mehr Yasht at 10.13 and 14 states that the Aryan abode (airyo-shayanem) was "where the high mountains (garayo berezanto), rich in pastures and waters, yield plenty to the cattle", and that when the Sun rises above the taro (peaks - see further discussion below) of the Hara, it casts its golden rays down on the abode of the Aryans......."Hara Berezaiti". The modern word Alburz is said to be derived from Hara Berezaiti....the Alburz (Hara) mountains......The one mountain range that fits this description very well is the Hindu Kush....."As recently as the 19th century, a peak in the northernmost range in the Hindu Kush system, just south of Balkh, was recorded as Mount Elburz in British army maps (i.e. the western arm of the Hindu Kush (Sanskrit as Pāriyātra Parvata and in Ancient Greek as the Caucasus Indicus)." The same mountains are also called the Aparsen (likely Gk. Paropamisus) in the Bundahishn. We are also given to understand that the highest peak of the Caucasus is also called "Elbrus". The poet Ferdowsi's references to the Alburz in his epic, the Shahnameh, lead us to the environs of Hind, perhaps meaning the mountains of the Upper Indus, the Hindu Kush, Pamirs, Karakorum and Himalayas - the Alburz or Hara Berezaiti of old. Strabo would call the Hara Berezaiti the Taurus Mountains, a string of mountains that ran from Turkey to the boundaries of China...Mary Boyce informs us that when the Khotanese Saka became Buddhists, they referred to Mt. Sumeru of Buddhist legends as Ttaira Haraysa, the peak of Hara. ."....... http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/aryans/location.htm#mountains

"Pre-Achaemenid period. Before the arrival of Iranian peoples in Central Asia, Sogdiana had already experienced at least two urban phases. The first was at Sarazm (4th-3rd m. BC), a town of some 100 hectares has been excavated, where both irrigation agriculture and metallurgy were practiced (Isakov). It has been possible to demonstrate the magnitude of links with the civilization of the Oxus as well as with more distant regions, such as Baluchistan. The second phase began in at least the 15th century BCE at Kök Tepe, on the Bulungur canal north of the Zarafšān River, where the earliest archeological material appears to go back to the Bronze Age, and which persisted throughout the Iron Age, until the arrival from the north of the Iranian-speaking populations that were to become the Sogdian group. It declined with the rise of Samarkand (Rapin, 2007). Pre-Achaemenid Sogdiana is recalled in the Younger Avesta (chap. 1 of the Vidēvdād, q.v.) under the name Gava and said to be inhabited by the Sogdians.

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

September 2015

John Hopkins....Northern New Mexico

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King Sophagasenus & The Kapisa Valley (206 BC)

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"Sophagasenos also spelt Sophagasenus or Sophagasenas (Sanskrit: Subhagasena) was a local King ruling in Kabul and Kapisa valley (Paropamisade of the classical writings) during the last decade of 3rd century BC..... Sophagasenus finds reference only in "The Histories" of Polybius. The identity of Sophagasenus is not clear. Many historians believe that Sophagasenus was a princely scion of the Mauryas of Magadha but others believe him to have been a non-Mauryan local ruler from the area he ruled i.e. from Kabul/Kapisa land. ....."

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"The Diadochi (Greek: Διάδοχοι, Diadokhoi, meaning "Successors") were the rival generals, families and friends of Alexander the Great who fought for control over his empire after his death in 323 BC. The Wars of the Diadochi mark the beginning of the Hellenistic period......."Ian Mladjov's Resources......diadokhoi195nbc.jpg.......https://sites.google.com/a/umich.edu/imladjov/home

"We do not know who the Sophagasenus was. "After Asoka's death ( 304–232 BC)...... the interest of his successors, west of Indus must have disappeared because when later on (~206 BC), Antiochus III, 6th successor of Seleucus entered the Indus valley, he was resisted not by Mauryas but by a local ruler named Subhagasena..." . One quite agrees with Dr Thapar, Dr Rawilson and other scholars as quoted above that the ancestry of Sophagasenus is unclear and uncertain and in no can it be linked to Maurya rulers of Magadha on the basis of flimsy and unreliable evidence of Taranatha who is a careless and untrustworthy writer of comparatively recent times.....http://www.liquisearch.com/sophagasenus/differing_opinions_on_the_antecedents_and_ancestry_of_sophagasenos

"Tāranātha (1575–1634) was a Lama of the Jonang school of Tibetan Buddhism. Taranatha was born in Tibet, supposedly on the birthday of Padmasambhava. His original name was Kun-dga'-snying-po, the Sanskrit equivalent of which is Anandagarbha. However, he adopted Taranatha, the Sanskrit name by which he was generally known, as an indication of the value he placed on his Sanskrit scholarship in an era when mastery of the language had become much less common in Tibet than it had once been. He was also paying homage to his Indian teacher, Buddhaguptanatha.... His best known work is the 143-folio History of Buddhism in India of 1608,which has been published in English. His other major work, The Golden Rosary, Origins of the Tantra of the Bodhisattva Tara of 1604 has also been translated into English.....

"...the story of Taranatha and one of his teachers named Buddhaguptanatha. .......Buddhaguptanatha (1514-1610? AD) was an Indian Buddhist yogin who also held and practiced several Hindu yogic traditions. Taranatha apparently discovered this fact while Buddhaguptanatha was in the midst of bestowing a series of empowerments that he himself had received from his guru, Shantigupta. Taranatha was particularly challenged by the idea that his teacher also practiced Hinduism. Sensing his student’s sectarian reaction Buddhaguptanatha became upset and abruptly left Tibet leaving the series of empowerments incomplete. It is humbling that even for a teacher as great as Taranatha, the notion of “pure” Buddhism being mixed with Hinduism was a challenge- that on some level his own sense of distinction got the better of him. ".....http://ganachakra.com/tag/buddhagupatnatha/.....Repa Dorje Odzer (Justin von Bujdoss) is the Co-Founder and Co-Executive Director of New York Tsurphu Goshir Dharma Center, the North American Dharma Center of His Eminence Goshir Gyaltsab Rinpoche.

"Polybius, the Greek historian, makes reference to Sophagasenus in context with Antiochus III’s expedition across the Caucasus Indicus (Hindu Kush Mountains) in around 206 BC. Having crossed the Caucasus Mountains, Antiochus moved up to Kabul and met Sophagasenus the King with whom he renewed league and friendship he had made previously. and received more elephants until he had one hundred and fifty of them altogether. He then returned home via Arachosia, Drangiana and Karmania. No other source except Polybius makes any reference to Sophagasenus."

"Polybius (Greek: Πολύβιος, Polýbios; c. 200 – c. 118 BC) was a Greek historian of the Hellenistic Period noted for his work, The Histories, which covered the period of 264–146 BC in detail....... Polybius' Account of Antiochus III by T. S. Brown.....Phoenix......Vol. 18, No. 2 (Summer, 1964), pp. 124-136

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Map showing Bactra (Modern day Balkh, Afghanistan) (here indicated as Bactres), the capital of Bactria......208–206 BC

"The Siege of Bactra lasted from 208 to 206 BC. After defeating the Bactrians at the Battle of the Arius the Seleucids besieged the capital of Bactria until news from the west of his dominions and lack of progress against the city led Antiochus to negotiate peace with Euthydemus and lift the siege. In the peace that was agreed Antiochus recognized Euthydemus as an ally, and he gave one of his daughters as a wife to the Bactrian king."

"Bactrian campaign and Indian expedition of Antiochos III.......The year 209 BC saw Antiochus in Bactria, where the Greco-Bactrian king Euthydemus I had supplanted the original rebel. Antiochus again met with success.......Euthydemus was defeated by Antiochus at the Battle of the Arius but after sustaining a famous siege in his capital Bactra (Balkh), he obtained an honourable peace by which Antiochus promised Euthydemus' son Demetrius the hand of one of his daughters......Antiochus next, following in the steps of Alexander, crossed into the Kabul valley, reaching the realm of Indian king Sophagasenus and returned west by way of Seistan and Kerman (206/5). According to Polybius:.....'He crossed the Caucasus (Hindu Kush) and descended into India; renewed his friendship with Sophagasenus (Subhashsena in Prakrit) the king of the Indians; received more elephants, until he had a hundred and fifty altogether; and having once more provisioned his troops, set out again personally with his army: leaving Androsthenes of Cyzicus the duty of taking home the treasure which this king had agreed to hand over to him.".........Polybius 11.34, Antiochus Moves from Bactria Through Interior Asia

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"From around 180 BCE the Greco-Bactrian ruler Demetrius, conquered the Kabul Valley and parts of northwestern India. Demetrius helped established an Indo-Greek kingdom from the Hindu Kush to Mathura, which was to last in parts until the end of the 1st century BCE, and under which Buddhism was able to flourish. In particular, one of the successors of Demetrius, the Indo-Greek "Saviour king" Menander (Pali: Milinda) was a strong benefactor of the Buddhist faith at that time.".....http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?50541-Indian-faction/page4

A 15th century reconstruction (by Nicolaus Germanus) of a 2nd-century map (by Ptolemy)....Click on the map to enlarge

"Paropamisadae (Greek: Παροπαμισάδαι) is the Bactrian pronunciation of the Old Persian word Para-upari-sena (I.e "beyond the raised land"), which was then hellenized by the Greeks to Paropamisus (Greek: Παροπαμισσός) and is the old Iranian word for the district of Gandhara in western Pakistan, centered upon the cities of Peshawar and Charsadda. Upari-Sena (I.e "raised lands"), in Old Persian, refers to the Hindu-Kush mountains. Para-upari-sena (I.e "beyond the raised lands"), refers to the Peshawar Valley which is situated immediately beyond these mountains and is the location of Gandhara.....The Paropamisadae was located north of Arachosia and Drangiana, east of Aria, south of Bactria, and west of Kashmir. There were two main rivers flowing through the land, the Coas or Cophen (Κωφήν) and the Dorgamanes (Δοργαμάνης) or Orgomanes (Ὀργομάνης) farther north......The major cities of the land were the city of Ortospana (Ὀρτοσπάνα) or Carura (Κάρουρα), probably identifiable with Kabul, Gauzaca (Γαύζακα), probably modern Ghazni, Capissa (Καπίσσα) in the northeast, and Parsia (Παρσία), the capital of the Parsii."

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

August 2015

John Hopkins....Northern New Mexico

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The Pāratas & King Yolamira (125 AD)

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"The Pāratas, an Iranian people and ruling dynasty from what is now western Pakistan, are known essentially through their coinage, which typically exhibit the bust of a particular monarch on the obverse ( having long hair within a headband), and a swastika within a circular legend on the reverse in Kharoshthi (usually copper coins) and sometimes in Brahmi (usually silver coins). Coins depicting Pārata monarchs have been found in and around the district of Loralai, Balochistan, western Pakistan. This may have been their capital."

"The Pāratas in Classical & Historical sources.....Herodotus in c. 440 BC describes the Paraitakenoi as a tribe ruled by Deiokes, an Iranic monarch who ruled on eastern-most region of the Iranian plateau. (History I.101)......Arrian describes how Alexander the Great encountered the Pareitakai in Bactria and Sogdiana, and had them conquered by Craterus (Anabasis Alexandrou IV)......The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea (1st century CE) describes the territory of the Paradon beyond the Ommanitic region, on the coast of Balochistan."

Coin 1: Yolamira, silver drachm, early type.....c. 125-150 AD......Diademed bust right, dotted border /Swastika right, Brahmi legend ..... Yolamirasa Bagarevaputasa Pāratarāja ......(Of Yolamira, son of Bagareva, Pārata King).....The names Yolamira and Bagareva betray the Iranian origin of this dynasty. The suffix Mira refers to the Iranian deity Mithra. Yolamira means "Warrior Mithra." Bagareva means "rich God."

"The Pāratarājas are identified as such by their coins: two series of coins, one mostly in copper bearing legends in Kharoshthi and the other mostly in silver bearing legends in Brahmi. Among coins known so far, there has been no overlap between the two series, which appear to be quite separate from one another, despite commonalities of content. The notable feature of both series is that almost all of the coins bear the name ‘Pāratarāja’ as part of the legend, and they nearly always bear a swastika on the reverse (the exceptions being some very small fractions that seem to eliminate the swastika and/or the long legend, including the words ‘Pāratarāja’, for lack of space). The coins are very rare and, when found, are discovered almost exclusively in the Pakistani province of Baluchistan, reportedly mostly in the area of Loralai..."......NEW LIGHT ON THE PĀRATARĀJAS by PANKAJ TANDON.......http://people.bu.edu/ptandon/Paratarajas.pdf

"According to Bon tradition, the founder of the orthodox Bon doctrine was Tonpa Shenrab Miwoche of Tagzig...... some writers identify the region with Balkh/Bactria. The name Shenrab has an Iranian sound to it.....One of the most powerful and resonant words in pre-Buddhist Tibet was yungdrung (g.yung drung). It was a the key terms for the old royal religion, the mythological backdrop to the kingly lineage of the Tibetan Empire. For example, the inscription of the tomb of Trisong Detsen has the line: “In accord with the eternal (yungdrung) customs (tsuglag), the Emperor and Divine Son Trisong Detsen was made the ruler of men.” I discussed how to translate that term tsuglag in an earlier post. Here, as you no doubt noticed, I have translated yungdrung here as “eternal”. Eternity seems to be the general meaning of yungdrung in the early religion. In addition, the word was associated with the ancient Indo-European swastika design, which in Tibet was the graphic symbol of the eternal...what did the early Buddhist writers and translators do with this term? Many of them just attached it to the word “dharma” (i.e. Buddhism), no doubt in an attempt to transfer its prestige from the earlier religion to Buddhism. Thus we see “the eternal dharma” (g.yung drung chos) in many Dunhuang manuscripts.".....http://earlytibet.com/2008/04/30/buddhism-and-bon-iii-what-is-yungdrung/

"the Pāradas of the Mahabharata, the Puranas and other Indian sources........

"...coins of Yolamira is in itself a breakthrough, as this is one king for whom we have independent evidence. Konow reports on some pottery fragments from Tor Dherai in the Loralai district that carry an inscription relating to one Shahi Yolamira. Konow says the name Yolamira is not known to us. These coins, found in the same area, provide further evidence of the existence of this king, and can place him in some historical context.....Once again, the validity of this reading is buttressed by examining the meaning of the name. In Bactrian, the name Yola-mira means ‘warrior Mithra’....http://people.bu.edu/ptandon/Paratarajas.pdf

"...Of the Shahi Yola Mira, the master of the vihara, this water hall (is) the religious gift, in his own Yola-Mira-shahi-Vihara, to the order of the four quarters, in the acceptance of the Sarvastivadin teachers. And from this right donation may there be in future a share for (his) mother and father, in future a share for all beings and long life for the master of the law’ .......Sten Konow, Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum, Vol. II pt. I, pp. 173

"....As permanent monasteries became established, the name "Vihara" was kept. Some Viharas became extremely important institutions, some of them evolving into major Buddhist Universities with thousands of students, such as Nalanda."

"fixing the reign of this dynasty in the interior of Baluchistan during the second and perhaps the third centuries AD fills an important gap in the history of the region. Very little has hitherto been known of the politics of this area from the time of Alexander’s departure to the arrival of Islamic invaders in the early eighth century. Some historians have tended to assume that the Kushans must have held sway over this region, but that hypothesis does not appear to be correct, as the Pāratarājas appear to have been ruling precisely at the time when the Kushan empire was at its zenith...".......http://people.bu.edu/ptandon/Paratarajas.pdf

"Given Konow’s suggestion that Kanishka began the use of the term Shahi, a suggested date for the Pāratarājas would be around the middle of the second century, give or take a quarter century or so."........http://people.bu.edu/ptandon/Paratarajas.pdf

"The swastika mark is not encountered on Kushan coins, but it is an element on Kushanshah coins.."..http://www.academia.edu/2078818/The_Mint_Cities_of_the_Kushan_Empire

"The Kabul Shahi also called Shahiya dynasties ruled one of the Middle kingdoms of India which included portions of the Kabulistan and the old province of Gandhara (now in northern Pakistan), from the decline of the Kushan Empire in the 3rd century to the early 9th century. The kingdom was known as Kabul Shahi (Kabul-shāhān or Ratbél-shāhān in Persian کابلشاهان یا رتبیل شاهان) between 565 and 879 when they had Kapisa and Kabul as their capitals, and later as Hindu Shahi.....The Shahis of Kabul/Gandhara are generally divided into the two eras of the "Buddhist Shahis" and the "Hindu Shahis", with the change-over thought to have occurred sometime around 870 AD with the Arab conquest....."....Sehrai, Fidaullah (1979). Hund: The Forgotten City of Gandhara,

"The mountainous region of Central Asia comprising the eastern parts of Afghanistan and Pakistan and northwest India has always known war. Even now, the area, high in the Hindu Kush mountains, proves difficult to hold......In the sixth century C.E., the place was known as Gondhara, and nominally controlled by the Huns—a people famed for being great horsemen and even greater warriors. Some 200 years later, Gondhara was ruled by a succession of kings called the Hindu Shahi.....It was the Hindu Shahi kings who first minted these silver coins—a simple and elegant representation of the diversity of the region. On one side is the Hun soldier on horseback; on the reverse, the bull that is so sacred to the Hindus."....http://www2.educationalcoin.com/2012/12/21/bull-horse/

Charles Frederick Oldham The Sun and the Serpent: A Contribution to the History of Serpent-worship, 1905..Serpent worship; The Shahis of Afghanistan

"King standing facing, head turned to right, Brāhmi legend at left: Koziya....Koziya issued several differnt types of copper drachms, some of very fine style, such as this one. So Koziya must have risen to the throne as a teenager and probably had quite a long reign, given the wide variety of types he issued."....http://coinindia.com/galleries-parata-rajas.html

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

July 2015

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