The word Yona in Pali and the Prakrits, and the analogue Yavana in Sanskrit, were used in Ancient India to designate Greek speakers. "Yona" and "Yavana" are transliterations of the Greek word for "Ionians", who were probably the first Greeks to be known in India.
The Indo-Scythians were a group of nomadic people of Iranic Scythian origin who migrated from Central Asia southward into the northwestern Indian subcontinent: the present-day South Asian regions of Afghanistan, Pakistan, Eastern Iran and northern India. The migrations persisted from the middle of the second century BCE to the fourth century CE.
Ancient Hindu and Buddhist texts use Uttarapatha as the name of the Northern part of Jambudvipa, one of the "continents" in Hindu mythology. In modern times, the Sanskrit word uttarapatha is sometimes used to denote the geographical regions of North India, Western India, Central India, Eastern India, Northeast India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nepal in just one term. The pronunciation of the word varies depending on the regional language of the speaker.
The Mahājanapadas were sixteen kingdoms and aristocratic republics that existed in Ancient India from the sixth to fourth centuries BCE, during the second urbanisation period.
Uttarakuru is the name of a dvipa ('continent') in ancient Hindu and Buddhist mythology as well as Jain cosmology. The Uttarakuru country or Uttara Kuru Kingdom and its people are sometimes described as belonging to the real world, whereas at other times they are mythical or otherworldly spiritual beings. The name Uttara Kuru means "North Kuru". The Kurus were a tribe during the Vedic civilization of India. The Uttara Kuru were therefore a population to the north of the Kurus, but somehow some Western historians have tried to equal kuru with Himalayas and say this as north of the Himalayas.
The Rishikas was an ancient Kingdom of Central Asia and South Asia, who are mentioned in Hindu and Sanskrit literary texts, including the Mahabharata, the Ramayana, the Brhat-Samhita, the Markendeya Purana and Patanjali's Mahabhashya.
Khasas were an ancient Indo-Aryan tribe and a late Janapada kingdom from Himalayan regions of northern Indian subcontinent mentioned in the various historical Indian inscriptions and ancient Indian Hindu and Tibetan literature. European sources described the Khasa tribe living in the Northwest Himalayas and the Roman geographer Pliny The Elder specifically described them as "Indian people". They were reported to have lived around Gandhara, Trigarta and Madra Kingdom as per the Mahabharata.
Daradas were an ancient people who lived north and north-west to the Kashmir Valley. This kingdom is identified to be the Gilgit region, in the Gilgit-Baltistan region along the river Sindhu or Indus. They are often spoken along with the Kambojas. The Pandava hero Arjuna had visited this country of Daradas during his northern military campaign to collect tribute for Yudhishthira's Rajasuya sacrifice. The country of Darada has also been mentioned in the Rasa Ratna Samucchaya, a book dealing about Rasasastra
The Chinas are a people mentioned in ancient Indian literature, such as the Mahabharata, Manusmriti, and the Puranic literature.
Kekaya was an ancient Indo-Aryan tribe of north-western South Asia whose existence is attested during the Iron Age. The members of the Kekaya tribe were called the Kaikayas.
Pāradas was an Iron age kingdom described in various ancient and classical Indian texts. The exact location of the kingdom is unknown. The Vayu Purana locates the tribe on the upper course of the Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers in Central Asia. The Mahabharata, however, associates the Paradas with the tribes of Uttarapatha, and places them on the Sailoda River in the Xinjiang province of China. Additionally, the Ramayana locates the people in the Himalayas.
The kingdom of Tushara, according to ancient Indian literature, such as the epic Mahabharata, was a land located beyond north-west India. In the Mahabharata, its inhabitants, known as the Tusharas, are depicted as mlechchas ("barbarians") and fierce warriors.
Sakas are described in Sanskrit sources as a Mleccha tribe grouped along with the Yavanas, Tusharas and Barbaras. There were a group of Sakas called Apa Sakas meaning water dwelling Sakas, probably living around some lake in central Asian steppes. Sakas took part in Kurukshetra War.
Hunas were a tribe close to Himalayas that, because of limited interaction with Indian kingdoms, were mentioned in the epic Mahabharata. They belonged to the Xinjiang province of China, east of Jammu-Kashmir. However, they were nomadic people who changed their settlements from time to time.
The Pahlavas are a people mentioned in ancient Indian texts. According to Patrick Carnegy, a Raj-era ethnographer, the 4th-century BCE Vartika of Katyayana mentions the Sakah-Parthavah, demonstrating an awareness of these Saka-Parthians, probably by way of commerce. Knowledge of the Pahlavas is distilled from the literary references in texts like the Manu Smriti, various Puranas, the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, and the Bṛhat Saṃhitā.
The Bahlikas were the inhabitants of a location called Bahlika, mentioned in the Atharvaveda, Mahabharata, Ramayana, Puranas, Vartikka of Katyayana, Brhatsamhita, Amarkosha, and other ancient inscriptions. Other variations of Bahlika include Bahli, Balhika, Vahlika, Valhika, Bahlava, Bahlam/Bahlim, Bahlayana, and Bahluva.
Komedes is the ethnonym of an ancient people in Central Asia. They were mentioned by the ancient Greek geographer Ptolemy in Geography. Traditional Hindu and Indian spellings included Kumuda, Kumuda-dvipa, and Parama Kambojas; and ancient Greek and Roman spellings included Komedes, Komedei, Traumeda, Caumedae, Homodotes, Homodoti, or Homodontes.B
The legacy of the Indo-Greeks starts with the formal end of the Indo-Greek Kingdom from the 1st century, as the Greek communities of central Asia and northwestern India lived under the control of the Kushan branch of the Yuezhi, Indo-Scythians and Indo-Parthian Kingdom. The Kushans founded the Kushan Empire, which was to prosper for several centuries. In the south, the Greeks were under the rule of the Scythian Western Kshatrapas.
The Silver Reliquary of Indravarman is an inscribed silver Buddhist reliquary dedicated by Apracaraja king Indravarman in the 1st century BCE, which has been found presumably in the Bajaur area of Gandhara. Believed to have been fabricated at Taxila, the silver reliquary consists of two parts—the base and the cover—both being fluted, and the cover being topped by a figure of long horned Ibex. It has been dated to around the eighth or ninth decades of the 1st century BCE and bears six inscriptions written in pointillē style, in Kharoshthi script and Gandhari/north-western Prakrit. In form, the silver vessel is wholly atypical of Buddhist reliquaries and is said to have been a wine goblet, similar to others found in Gandhara and Kapisa regions. The vessel was later reused by Apraca king Indravarman as a Reliquary to enshrine Buddhist relics in a stüpa raised by Indravarman. The inscriptions on the silver reliquary provide important new information not only about the history of the kings of Apraca dynasty themselves but also about their relationships with other rulers of the far north-western region of traditional India i.e. modern northern Pakistan and eastern Afghanistan around the beginning of Christian era.
The Kingdom of Kapisa, appearing in contemporary Chinese sources as Caoguo and Jibin, was a state located in what is now Afghanistan during the late 1st millennium. Its capital was the city of Kapisa. The kingdom stretched from the Hindu Kush in the north to Bamiyan and Kandahar in the south and west, out as far as the modern Jalalabad District in the east.
