1854.] On the Ballads and Legends of the Punjab. 75 



impossible not to perceive at a glance, that the figure of the horse- 

 man in the graceful ease of its outline had been derived from Gre- 

 cian models ; whilst the horseman's turban and physiognomy are 

 precisely those of the Goojjur tribe, the oldest race in Huzara. 

 But I had no hope of ever finding farther proof of Earn Chundre'a 

 connection with the Greeks until a silver* coin was brought me, 

 bearing his effigy on the one side, and on the reverse a Grecian 

 legend. 



This curious discovery served as a connecting link to a chain of 

 circumstantial evidence, which has been gradually forming in my 

 mind. The type of Earn Chundre was in use upon the coinage of 

 the Punjaub, whilst Greek continued to be the language of the 

 Court. "Who then was this Earn Chundre ? and was the fabulous 

 demi-god here alluded to ? or was Earn Chundre the name of the 

 reigning King, since deified by the spirit of hero worship ? Hindus 

 reckon several Earn Chundres. The first was probably that Osiris 

 who extended his peaceful conquest to the Punjaub. A colony 

 planted by him was found by Alexander in the country between the 

 Indus and the Loondi Eiver. The town of Leeia on the Indus yet 

 bears his name. At the festival of the Earn Leila, a festival un- 

 doubtedly established by him, all the emblems of the Bacchanalian 

 revels are still preserved. And Arrian remarking upon the fact of 

 Alexander's fleet being followed by the Indians along the Hydaspes 

 with song and dance, observes that Indians have been lovers of the 

 song and dance beyond all others ever since they revelled with 

 Bacchus on Indian land. 



But besides this Earn Chundre whose name Earn Iswa or the 

 Lord Earn is so remarkably like Eameses, as to cause doubt whether 

 Osiris and Eameses were not one, there was at least one other 

 Earn, whom Hindus are careful not to confound with the first. The 

 birth-place of this Eaam was Aodia,f a name at the present day ap- 

 plied almost exclusively to Oude : but formerly the Northern por- 



* See No. 11, of the Plate. 



f The Ayodia which was the birth-place of Raam the Conqueror is merely men- 

 tioned as such in the Puranas, and does not again appear in Hindu history. It is 

 probable therefore that it was not then a very considerable place, however extolled 

 by Hindu poets of after days. Raam is stated to have conquered the Dekkun, i. e. 



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