Note 20 — Chapter IX · THE EUPHRATES FRONTIER AND THE PARTHIANS.

The Indo-Greek and the Indo-Parthian rulers, just as the Kadphises, make use on their coins to a large extent of the indigenous Indian language and writing alongside of the Greek: the Sacian kings on the other hand never used the Indian language and Indian alphabet, but employ exclusively the Greek letters, and the non-Greek legends of their coins are beyond doubt Scythian. Thus on Kanerku’s gold pieces there sometimes stands βασιλεὺς βασιλέων Κανήρκου, sometimes ραο νανοραο κανηρκι κορανο, where the first two words must be a Scythian form of the Indian Rajâdi Rajah, and the two following contain the personal and the family name (Gushana) of the king (Oldenberg, l.c. p. 294). Thus these Sacae were foreign rulers in India in another sense than the Bactrian Hellenes and the Parthians. Yet the inscriptions set up under them in India are not Scythian but Indian.