Captain Sir Alexander Burnes was a Scottish explorer, military officer and diplomat associated with the Great Game. He was nicknamed Bokhara Burnes for his role in establishing contact with and exploring Bukhara. His memoir, Travels into Bokhara, was a bestseller when it was first published in 1835.
Sophytes, or Saubhuti, was the name of a king in Bactria or the northwestern Indian subcontinent during the time of the Alexander's invasion. Sophytes surrendered to Alexander and was allowed to retain his kingdom. Probably another Sophytes, who was satrap in the eastern territories conquered by Alexander the Great, minted his own coins in the Greek style circa 300 BCE. Rapson and some others have considered them as the same person.
Arachosia, or Harauvatis, was a satrapy of the Achaemenid Empire. Mainly centred around the Arghandab River, a tributary of the Helmand River, it extended as far east as the Indus River. The satrapy's Persian-language name is the etymological equivalent of Sárasvatī in Vedic Sanskrit. In Greek, the satrapy's name was derived from Arachōtós, the Greek-language name for the Arghandab River. Around 330 BCE, Alexander the Great commissioned the building of Alexandria Arachosia as Arachosia's new capital city under the Macedonian Empire. It was built on top of an earlier Persian military fortress after Alexander's conquest of Persia, and is the site of today's Kandahar in Afghanistan.
Gedrosia is the Hellenized name of the part of coastal Balochistan that roughly corresponds to today's Makran. In books about Alexander the Great and his successors, the area referred to as Gedrosia runs from the Indus River to the north-eastern edge of the Strait of Hormuz. It is directly to the south of the countries of Bactria, Arachosia and Drangiana, to the east of the country of Carmania and due west of the Indus River which formed a natural boundary between it and Western India. The native name of Gedrosia might have been Gwadar as there are two towns by that name and a bay in central Makran.
Aornos was the site of Alexander the Great's last siege, which took place on April 326 BC, at a mountain site located in modern Pakistan. Aornos offered the last threat to Alexander's supply line, which stretched, dangerously vulnerable, over the Hindu Kush back to Balkh, though Arrian credits Alexander's desire to outdo his kinsman Heracles, who allegedly had proved unable to take a fort that the Macedonians called Ἄορνος Aornos : meaning "birdless" in Greek. According to one theory, the name is a corruption of an Indo-Iranian word, such as *awarana "fortified place". According to Arrian, the rock had a flat summit well-supplied with natural springs and wide enough to grow crops: it could not be starved into submission. Neighboring tribesmen who surrendered to Alexander offered to lead him to the best point of access.
Mallus was an ancient city of Cilicia Campestris lying near the mouth of the Pyramus river, in Anatolia. In ancient times, the city was situated at the mouth of the Pyramus, on a hill opposite Magarsa which served as its port. The district was named after it, Mallotis. The location of the site is currently inland a few km from the Mediterranean coast on an elevation in the Karataş Peninsula, Adana Province, Turkey, a few km from the city of Karataş.
Aria was an Achaemenid region centered on the city of Herat in present-day western Afghanistan. In classical sources, Aria has been several times confused with the greater region of ancient Ariana, of which Aria formed a part.
The recorded history of Lahore, the second largest city-district of Pakistan, covers thousands of years. Lahore is regarded as the post medieval or modern day capital and largest city of the Punjab region, it has since its creation changed hands from Ghaznavid, Hindu, Buddhist, Greek, Muslim, Mughal, Ghorid, Maratha, Sikh and the British, thereby becoming the cultural capital and the heart of modern-day Pakistan.
The Partition of Babylon was the first of the conferences and ensuing agreements that divided the territories of Alexander the Great. It was held at Babylon in June 323 BC. Alexander’s death at the age of 32 had left an empire that stretched from Greece all the way to India. The issue of succession resulted from the claims of the various supporters of Philip Arrhidaeus, and the as-of-then unborn child of Alexander and Roxana, among others. The settlement saw Arrhidaeus and Alexander’s child designated as joint kings with Perdiccas serving as regent. The territories of the empire became satrapies divided between the senior officers of the Macedonian army and some local governors and rulers. The partition was solidified at the further agreements at Triparadisus and Persepolis over the following years and began the series of conflicts that comprise the Wars of the Diadochi.
Alexandria Ariana was a settlement founded by Alexander the Great in 330 BC during his invasion of Persia and Central Asia. The city was the first of many founded by Alexander to be established in the eastern satrapies of the crumbling Achaemenid Empire. The remains of the ancient city lie in the general area of the modern settlement of Herat, Afghanistan, in the ancient regions of Aria and Ariana. There has been extensive historical debate regarding the relationship of Alexander's foundation to the Achaemenid citadel of Artacoana, its predecessor. As no excavations of Herat have taken place, the precise location of Alexandria Ariana is unknown.
Boukephala and Nikaia (Νίκαια) were two cities founded by Alexander the Great on either side of the Hydaspes during his invasion of the Indian subcontinent. The cities, two of many founded by Alexander, were built shortly after his victory over the Indian king Porus at the Battle of the Hydaspes in early 326 BC.
Shashigupta IAST: Śaśigupta was a ruler of Paropamisadae, between the Hindu Kush mountains and Indus Valley during the 4th century BCE. The name Shashigupta is a reconstruction of a hypothetical Indo-Aryan name, based on a figure named in ancient Greek and Roman sources as Sisikottos (Arrian), and Sisocostus (Curtius).
Artacoana or Artacana or Articaudna (Ἀρτίκαυδνα) or Chortacana or Artacaena, name of the capital of Aria, an eastern satrapy of the Persian empire.
In the Greco-Roman world, Ariana was a geographical term referring to a general area of land between Central Asia and the Indus River. Situated far to the east in the Achaemenid Empire, it covered a number of satrapies spanning what is today the easternmost parts of Iran, the entirety of Afghanistan, and the westernmost parts of Pakistan. "Ariana" is Latinized from Greek: Ἀρ(ε)ιανή Ar(e)ianē [region]; Ἀρ(ε)ιανοί Ar(e)ianoi [demonym]. The Greek word, in turn, is derived from the term Airyanem in Old Persian.
There are numerous surviving ancient Greek and Latin sources on Alexander the Great, king of Macedon, as well as some Asian texts. The five main surviving accounts are by Arrian, Plutarch, Diodorus Siculus, Quintus Curtius Rufus, and Justin. In addition to these five main sources, there is the Metz Epitome, an anonymous late Latin work that narrates Alexander's campaigns from Hyrcania to India. Much is also recounted incidentally by other authors, including Strabo, Athenaeus, Polyaenus, Aelian, and others. Strabo, who gives a summary of Callisthenes, is an important source for Alexander's journey to Siwah.
The Indian campaign of Alexander the Great began in 327 BC and lasted until 325 BC. After conquering the Achaemenid Persian Empire, the Macedonian army undertook an expedition into the northwestern Indian subcontinent. Within two years, Alexander expanded the Macedonian Empire to include present-day Punjab and Sindh in what is modern-day Pakistan, surpassing the earlier frontiers that had been established by the Persian conquest of the Indus Valley.
The origin of Lahore's name is unclear. The first document that mentions Lahore by name is the Hudud al-'Alam, written in 982 CE.
The Cophen campaign was conducted by Alexander the Great in the Kabul Valley between May 327 BC and March 326 BC. It was conducted against the Aspasioi, the Guraeans, and the Assakenoi tribes in the Kunar valley of Afghanistan, and Panjkora (Dir) and Swat valleys in what is now Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. The goal of the campaign was to secure the Macedonian line of communications so that the Macedonian army could proceed into India proper.
The Histories of Alexander the Great is the only surviving extant Latin biography of Alexander the Great. It was written by the Roman historian Quintus Curtius Rufus in the 1st-century AD, but the earliest surviving manuscript comes from the 9th century.
For the ancient Greeks, “India" referred to the polity situated east of Persia and south of the Himalayas. Although, during different periods of history, "India" referred to a much wider or much less extensive place.
