The Trojan Elephant

Abstract

This chapter details events that occurred from 323 to 135 BCE. It shows that between the arrival of the Greeks and their departure, India became a literate culture. This does not mean that literacy was very widespread in society: it does not have to penetrate to every level to be an important technological innovation. Some Indians discovered that this new technology of the invaders was useful, and employed it for their own purposes. Not least, it represented the beginning of an Indian “coinage tradition.” The Bactrian kings issued a coinage resembling the Seleucid (though the artistic quality of the portraits on them is startlingly high, and Bactrian coins may be, in the opinion of many, the most beautiful coins ever produced). They are entirely Greek in conception.