82 On the Ballads and Legends of the Punjab. [No. 1, 



The size of Eussaloo's foes is no doubt enormously exaggerated ; 

 but it seems to me that the tradition of their gigantic stature, may 

 have had some foundation in fact. For a coin* is common in Huza- 

 ra and the trans-Indus territory, which must have been struck by 

 some king almost coeval -with Eussaloo, having on one side the 

 figure of a giant astride upon an elephant, which shrinks to a mere 

 pony beneath him ; he being astride not upon the neck, but upon 

 the back of the elephant — a posture impossible to a being of human 

 bulk. The reverse is sometimes a figure of Ceres, or of plenty, with 

 the cornucopia. At others, it is that of a man who has just struck 

 with one fist, and has drawn back the other to repeat the blow. This 

 figure is also probably intended to represent a giant. At other 

 times the reverse exhibits the four-armed figure occurring upon 

 some of the coins of Kanerki. At others it is a figure facing the 

 East and either sacrificing or obtesting. At other times it is a giant 

 leaning on a trident. The legend, which is always in Greek charac- 

 ters, is seldom legible, owing partly to the character having become 

 barbarised, partly to the effects of weather upon the copper : but 

 more especially to the discordance between the Greek character and 

 the foreign name or word recorded. 



Upon one in my possession however I can distinctly decipher the 

 word or name AAooAi, Alooli, which, as above stated, is an old moun- 

 tain site in Huzara, a reputed haunt of the Eakuss, where accord- 

 ing to some of the traditions, one of the monsters was slain by 

 Eussaloo. This site was very possibly named after the king or 

 ruler who struck the coin in question. The elephant-strider is 

 most probably his image. 



This choice of a site in the mountains so strong as that of Alooli, 

 denotes that the plain was not safe for him, and is in keeping with 

 the whole tradition of Eussaloo's contests with the Eakuss. 



The coin belongs to the Seytho- Greek series, and appears to fol- 

 low immediately after those generally attributed to Baraoro, if we 

 may judge by the types and execution. The name Eakuss is claim- 

 ed by Sungscrit scholars as a corruption of Eukshasa. But I know 

 no reason why the Hindoos may not have borrowed it from the 

 Greek verb "pa/cow" (to rend, tear), or why it may not be com- 

 * See Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 of the Plate. 



