Essay name: Purana Bulletin
Author:
Affiliation: University of Kerala / Faculty of Oriental Studies
The "Purana Bulletin" is an academic journal published in India. The journal focuses on the study of Puranas, which are a genre of ancient Indian literature encompassing mythological stories, traditions, and philosophical teachings. They represent Hindu scriptures in Sanskrit and cover a wide range of subjects.
Purana, Volume 8, Part 1 (1966)
23 (of 340)
External source: Shodhganga (Repository of Indian theses)
Download the PDF file of the original publication
Jan. 1966] MEGASTHENES AND THE INDIAN CHRONOLOGY 15 from Dionysus to Alexander. And that is exactly how Solinus
uses it, even if without the implication of Magadha such as Arrian
has. Arrian too is justified in using it to describe the time-span
from Dionysus to Sandrocottus. For, the two time-spans could
not be much different. Alexander and Sandrocottus were con-
temporaries, and the gap of over 409 years which is there between
the number in Arrian and that in Pliny or Solinus is a gross
mistake. Arrian's time-span should really be not so much less
nor even the same but a little more. Plutarch' as well as Justin虏
record that when Alexander, some time after his invasion, met
Sandrocottus, the latter was not yet a king. According to
Plutarch, the meeting took place round about the time the
Macedonians "most resolutely opposed Alexander when he insisted
that they should cross the Ganges". Alexander's progress came
to a halt at approximately the end of July 326 B. C.鲁. Thus we
are sure that Sandrocottus mounted the throne of Palibothra later
than this date. If we accept the more detailed time-span-6451
years and 3 months-conveyed by Pliny and Solinus as our basis
and if we try to guess the one in Arrian by introducing the least
possible changes in the figures which he supplies, Sandrocottus's
coronation must have been not 6042 but 6452 years after what
Arrian calls "the time of Dionysus" and Pliny "the days of
Father Bacchus".
Here we must consider the import of these two phrases, for
they determine how we should count the 153 or 154 kings. Do
they direct us to the beginning of Dionysus's kingship in India or
to the end of it ? In other words, is Dionysus included in the
153 or 154 kings? The phrase "From...to" employed by all the
writers is ambiguous, whether we apply it to the "time" and
"days" or to the king-number. Luckily we have an unequivocal
phrase in Solinus to guide us: "the calculation being made by
counting the kings who reigned in the intermediate period..."
The reference is to the number of years and months from Dionysus
1. Life of Alexander, LXIII. 2. Historiarum Philippicarum, XV. 1 v.
3. "Foreign Invasions" by R. K. Mookerji, The Age of Imperial Unity,
p. 50.
