1840.] from Bactrian and Indo-Scythian coins. 4/1 



But this is to be accounted for by a similar negligence in ex- 

 pression, as Strabo sometimes commits. He afterwards places 

 certain nations between the Paropamisades and the Indus, 

 which is a striking contradiction. 



The following statement of Strabo is of far greater importance. 

 According to him, the whole country between the Indian sea in 

 the south, and the Paropamisus and Caucasus on the north, the 

 Indus in the east, and Karmania, Persia, and Media, in the west, 

 is an immense square, which is comprehended under the general 

 name Ariana ; the Gedrosians, Arachosians, Paropamisades, in 

 parallel layers are superimposed one on another. We shall not 

 dispute the systematical regularity of this view, in favour of 

 which the Paropamisades are extended to the Indus. Ptolemy, 

 who distributes in the same manner these nations, and defines 

 more correctly the boundaries of the Paropamisades, does not use 

 this general term, nor does it occur in the narratives of Macedo- 

 nian history. Strabo has perhaps got it from the Parthian and 

 Bactrian history by Apollodoros. It is true, he says, that 

 the name Ariana likewise refers to some tribes of the Persians, 

 Medians, Sogdians, and Bactrians, or, (to apply here our mo- 

 dern information), that the ancient name Aarja of the Arians, 

 was also in use with the four principal nations of Iran, before 

 mentioned, but he distinctly places between the western 

 and northern Iran, properly thus called, and India lying 

 more to east, his Ariana, as a separate division, as an inter- 

 mediate country, in which the nationalities balanced towards 

 both directions, and were neither of a marked Indian nor Irani- 

 an character. But more precise investigation would certainly 

 prove, that his view, concerning such a great nation, forming a 

 transition from the Persians to the Indians, though it generally 

 were correct, still must be defined more correctly in various 

 points of view, to bear upon the different divisions (of that 

 nation) . The Airjana of the Zenda vesta, however like in name, 

 has certainly nothing in common with this Ariana, though many 

 be pleased to confound them. 



We must hereafter take up again the thread of the inquiry, 

 what situation between the Indians and Persians the Paropami- 

 sades have occupied ? 



