316 Note on Lieutenant Burnes’ (June, 
‘derstood, and that the passage intended to express ‘‘ 150 years after 
the emancipation of the Lord Saxya Sinwa.”’ 
The epoch of Saxya, (the fifth BunpHa, or GouTama,) isdetermined 
by concurrent testimony of the Ceylonese, Siamese, Pegue, Burmese, and 
Chinese zras, which are all founded on the birth or death of the Bud- 
dha legislator, and, though all differing more or less, concur in placing 
him between the limits of 544 and 638 years B. C.: the Raj Gurd 
of Asam, a Pundit well versed in Buddha literature, fixes the Nirwan 
or emancipation of Saxya-Muni in 520 B. C.* Taking then from 
this epoch an interval of four hundred years to the reign of Kaniska, 
the latter would fall near the end of the second century B. C. We 
know from other sources, that the overthrow of the Bactrian dynasty 
by the Scythian or Sakyan tribes happened in 134 B. C. (125 by 
Scuuecet.) The present coin therefore confirms the fidelity of the Raja 
Taringini as a historical work, and leaves no doubt of the epoch of Saxya. 
Mr. Witson finds grounds for throwing back the termination of 
the reign of ApHimanya ,Canisuca’s successor, from B. C. 118, as 
given in the Raja Taringini, to B. C. 388, because ‘“‘ Kashmir be- 
came a Buddha country under Tartar princes shortly after the death of 
Saxya ;” but from Mr. Csoma’s subsequent examinationof the Tibetan 
sacred books, in which the three periods of their compilation are ex- 
pressly stated; ‘first, under Saxya himself (520—638 B. C.) 
then under Asuoxa, king of Pataliputra, 110 years after the decease of 
Saxya, and lastly by Kanisxa, upwards of 400 years after Saxya”— 
little doubt can remain that the epoch as it stands in the Raja Tarin- 
gini is correct. 
There are other circumstances connected with the Bactrian coins, which 
tend to confirm the supposition of a Buddhist succession to the Greek 
princes. In the first place, the reverse ceases to bear the formerly na- 
tional emblem of the Bactrian horseman with the Macedonian spear, 
and in itsplace a sage appears holding a flower, and invariably having a 
glory round his head, proving him to be a sacred personagef ; secondly, 
although upon the first coins of the dynasty we find the inscription in 
Greek characters—(a custom which prevailed under the Arsacide 
also, and continued under the first Sassanian princes ;) still upon coins 
of the same device, but probably of later fabric, we find the same kind 
of character which appears upon the Delhi and Allahabad pillars :—the 
same which is found at Ellora and in many ancient caves and temples 
* Orient. Mag. iv. 108. 
+ (See Col. Tov’s Coins 11,14; Mr. Wixson’s Plates, fig. 1, 2, 6, 7; and 
this Journal, Plate ii. figs. 17, 18.) 
