Note 4 — Chapter I · Earliest Times to the Death of Alexander

The Greek historians, following a tradition which made the conquests of Sesostris (Rameses II.) even more extensive than they really were, maintain that this conqueror penetrated into Bactria and Scythia. Rameses II. flourished in the thirteenth century before our era. Cf. Maspero, Hist. Anc. des Peuples de l’Orient, p. 225. Equally fabulous is the account given by Diodorus Siculus of the conquest of Bactria by Ninus and Semiramis in B.C. 2180. Cf. E. Drouin, loc. cit.