4 GEEEK KINGS OF BACTEIA AND INDIA

being disfigured by an excessive amount of fanciful conjecture.
Perhaps this criticism applies with the greatest force to Cunning-
ham's attempts at explaining the monograms—see British Mwsewni
Catalogue, Introduction, p. xxxviiL But I think it would be equally
difficult to prove or disprove the truth of these theories, and no one
else has so far ventured to grapple with the subject. Cunningham
may have attempted too much, but these essays still remain the only
full accounts of the Indo-Greek series of coins, and are remarkable
testimony to the knowledge and ingenuity of their author. During
the sixty years covered by his activities, Cunningham, who eventually
became Director of Archaeology in India, was an unremitting col-
lector of Indo-Greek coins, and spared neither trouble nor expense in
their acquisition. The result is to be seen in the truly superb Cabinet
of Indo-Greek medals in the British Museum, which contains his
entire Collection, Almost every known type and variety, some of
which are still unpublished, are to be seen,, and many of the rarest
coins are represented by several specimens,

A companion to Cunningham's Coins of Alexander's Successors
in the East is Von Sallet's Die Nachfolger Alexanders des Grossen in
Saktrien und Indien (Berlin, 1879). A well-known modern worker
in the same field is Professor E. J. Eapson, who amongst other essays
has written papers entitled Indian Coins, Notes on Indian Coins
and Seals, and Coins of the Graeco-Indian Sovereigns Agathocleia,
Strato I Sotert and Strato II Philopator.

It is a mistake to suppose that the Greek princes of the Panjab
and the North-West Frontier were the direct successors of Alexander
the Great. The Macedonian conqueror did not leave behind him any
permanent settlements in India itself, but a Greek kingdom was
firmly established in Syria under Seleukos and his successors, and
it was from, a province of this new kingdom that the second Greek
invasion of India came, more than a century after Alexander's death.
That province was Bactriana or Bactria, the country north of the
Hindu Kush, whose capital was on the site of the present Balkh.
We learn from the brief statements of the historians Trogus, Justin,
,and Strabo, that Diodotos, the satrap of Bactriana, took advantage
of the disturbances which followed the death of Antiochos Theos,
to make himself independent. The date of his revolt was about
246 B. 0. It is also known from history that Diodotos was succeeded
by his son of the same name, who was supplanted by Euthydemos;
and that Demetrios, the son of Euthydemos, was deposed by
Enkratides5 who was himself murdered, and succeeded by his own
son, of name unknown. It was Euthydemos who extended the
Bactrian power into the Kabul Valley, and so to India proper, and