Free Ashoka: The Search for India's Lost Emperor by Charles R. Allen Page B

elephant, ancient symbols of royalty and strength – Sandrokoptos offends King Nandrus and flees for his life. He then collects allies, themselves outlaws, and subsequently turns the local Indian population against Alexander’s local satraps in Gandhara – Alexander’s murdered governor Philippos and his successors Eudemos and Peithon – before going on to win the throne of India. All this is achieved before Seleukos the Victor had secured his position as basileus; that is to say, some years before 305 BCE , when Seleukos launched his attack across the Indus.
    That attack took Seleukos deep into the Gangetic plains, perhaps even as far as Sandrokoptos’s capital, known to the Greeks as Palibothra or Palimbothra. The latter’s forces then counter-attacked and drove Seleukos back across the Indus and deep into his own territories. The war was then concluded with a peace treaty, under the terms of which the Macedonian king relinquished all claims to India in return for five hundred war elephants, cemented with a marriage. The Greek historians are unusually taciturn on the finer details of this treaty, and only Pliny admits to the loss of Greek territory: ‘The Indians afterwards held a large part of Ariane [a satrapy of the Persian empire encompassing what is now eastern Iran, south-westernAfghanistan and Baluchistan] which they had received from the Macedonians, entering into marriage relations with him, and giving in return five hundred elephants, of which Sandrakottos had nine thousand.’ 16

    Coin of Seleukos Nikator as
basileus
; on the reverse some of his Indian war elephants presented to him by the Indian king Sandrokoptos together with their Indian
mahouts
or drivers. The elephants are here shown in battle armour and drawing Nike, goddess of victory, in a war chariot. (British Museum)
    In return for five hundred elephants – which the Indian ruler Sandrokoptos could well afford to lose – Seleukos surrendered not only all the lands conquered by Alexander east of the Indus but also Gandhara and Ariana. This was an unequal treaty, which Seleukos had to accept because he needed his eastern border settled so that he could move his troops to take on Antigonos, his one remaining rival west of Mesopotamia. The concluding marriage settlement between the two monarchs was also unequal, in that it was the loser who gave his daughter to the victor rather than the other way round. TheGreeks and Romans are silent on the details, which further suggests that it was Seleukos who gave a daughter in marriage to Sandrokoptos – or to the son and heir of Sandrokoptos.
    Basileus Seleukos the Victor and King Sandrokoptos subsequently remained on good terms, but the former was much preoccupied in destroying Antigonos and securing Asia Minor for himself and for his son Antiochos. Yet Seleukos sent embassies to the Indian king’s capital at Palimbothra, a practice that would be continued by his son and successor Antiochos – whose sister would by then be either a queen or a princess at the Indian court. The first two of these ambassadors were Megasthenes, who was present at the court of King Sandrokoptos, and Deimachos, who, it will be seen, knew Sandrokoptos’s son and successor – identified by Strabo as King Allitrochades and by Athenaios as King Amitrochates.
    Only fragments of Megasthenes’
India
survive but the writings of both men provided valuable source material for Arrian, Diodorus, Pliny the Elder and Strabo. The ambassadors observed Indian society at first hand, and what they noted down remained the best account of India available to Western Europe for more than fifteen hundred years. Like all good diplomats they gathered intelligence, taking careful note of the administration and how it worked, the strength and running of its army, the class structure of the country, its economy and natural resources. They also observed how the capital city of Palimbothra was defended, where it was located and how far it was from