Note 201 — BOOK IV JUDEA, GREECE, AND INDIA (continued 3)

The stages by which Bactria degenerated into Afghanistan may be studied neatly in the progressive deterioration of its coinage from a decent standard of Hellenic accomplishment into the vague flourishes of Orientalism; it began by displaying a Heracles of pure Greek blood and a pair of horsemen who would hardly have seemed out of place on the frieze of the Parthenon, and it fell steadily to a level of incompetence only equalled by the crude imitations of Roman currency that were being made in pre-Roman Britain about the same time.—P. G.