1892-93.] THE BUDDHIST INSCRIPTIONS OF INDIA. 271 



The mind of the people to serve Afumi sets up the usual orderly customary- 

 writing 480 after Buddha." 



This, Professor Dowson interprets : " In the Samvat year 47, in 

 Grishma (the hot season), the 4th month, the 4th day. Gift to the 

 Vihara of the great king, the king of kings, the son of heaven, Huvishka 

 by the mendicant Jivaka Udeyana. May it be to the benefit, welfare, 

 and happiness of all in the four quarters (of the world)." -- 



In commenting briefly upon the preceding inscriptions, which will be 

 discussed at length in my Eastern Track of the Hittites, the first thing 

 to consider is the matter of date. The era is that of the death of Buddha, 

 for which many dates are given, varying from 543 to 477 B. C. 

 Vikramaditya is said to have fixed the Samvat era in 56 B. C, and with 

 this statement the last inscription, which puts an event in his reign 480 

 years after Buddha, or 63 years B. C, according to the long computation 

 of that reformer's death, agrees. But No. 3 places Tsurami or Asoka in 

 243 after Buddha, and No. 2 makes Diodotus of Bactria his contemporary. 

 Now, the eldest Diodotus began to reign about 255 B.C., and the younger 

 in 237 B.C. If 543 be the date of Buddha's death, Tsurami's date and 

 that of Diodotus is 300 B.C. ; but, if 477 be the true figures, the interview 

 between Tsurami and Diodotus was in 234 B.C., which better satisfies 

 chronology. The Buddhist convention under Asoka is said to have been 

 held about 250 B.C., so that the date 543 is completely ruled out of court. 

 The oldest date found, that of Kafutake, is 337, that of Tsumaki is 317, 

 and that of Vicramaditya, 3 A.D. 



Kafutake is the Gopaditya of the Raja Tarangini, which presents its 

 array of Turanian monarchs in a Sanscrit dress, and he is the Sopeithes 

 of Strabo, or, as Curtius calls him, Sopithis.-- Strabo calls him a 

 monarch of the Cathaei, and says that he opened his city gates to 

 Alexander of Macedon and entertained him royally. This was in 326 

 B.C., or eleven years later than the inscription. Kafutake must have 

 been an old man before he died, for another inscription of his states that, 

 in 180 after Buddha, he superseded the Nandas by the Sakas. He may 

 thus be also identified with Chandra Gupta, who overthrew the -Nandas. 

 Tsumaki, therefore, whose date is 317, must have been his contemporary 

 during part of his long reign, and may be identified with the Sisunaga 

 who helped Chandra Gupta in his revolution, and with the Sangaeus, 

 whom, according to Arrian, Alexander set over Peucolaitis.-* Both 

 Kafutake and Tsumaki belonged to the Sakas or Sacae, but the former 

 was also elevated to the throne of the Kita, who are the Cathaei of 

 ancient writers on India. The Indian name for Tsurami is Dharma, 

 often conjoined with his religious title Asoka, which is just the Japanese 

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