1854.] Coins of Indian Buddhist Satraps. 693 



and of the places of discovery of their coins being within the pro- 

 bable limits of the ancient kingdom of Delhi. The satrap coins 

 and inscriptions, which yet remain to be described, have been found 

 on.y in the western Punjab, excepting a few rare specimens from 

 Jelalabad and Peshawur. The metropolis of this western Satrapy I 

 would fix at Taxila, near Manikyala, where two inscriptions have 

 been found which contain the names of three different satraps. 

 Delhi and Taxila may therefore be considered as the eastern and 

 western satrapies of the Indian portion of the great empire of the 

 Indo-Scythians. Between these extreme points lay the satrapy or 

 principality of CheJca, the ancient Sakala, which stretched from the 

 Pi-po-she (the Vipasa or Byas) on the east, to the Sin-thu (the 

 Sindhu or Indus) on the west, and from the foot of the Rajaori 

 hills to the confluence of the Punjab rivers.* The Buddhists have 

 celebrated the conversion of Milindu Eaja of Sakala by their great 

 teacher Nagarjuna, shortly after the commencement of the Christian 

 era. Another king of She-ko-lo or Sakala is mentioned by Hwan 

 Thsang as having reigned several hundred years before his time. 

 This king he calls Ma-yi-lo-kiu-lo, who may possibly be the same as 

 the Mahigula of our coins. Hwan Thsang travelled in India from 

 A. D. 629 to 645. If therefore to 640 we add 150 B. C, the 

 approximate date of Mahigula, we obtain 790 years as a fair measure 

 of the vague statement of the Chinese traveller. 



The Chinese name is spelt Mo-hi-h-kiu-lo by Stanislas Julien,t 

 who renders it most correctly by the Sanksrit Mahirakula. This 

 may indeed be the true name on the coins, for the first two syllables 

 of the name are found only on Mr. Bay ley's specimen, and I read 

 them at first as Mani. But we are not yet sufficiently conversant 

 with the compounds of the Ariano Pali alphabet to pronounce posi- 

 tively that the letter r when preceding a consonant was omitted. 



* The northern boundary of Cheka was only two days' journey from Rajaori, 

 that is the foot of the Punjab hills. While to the south Cheka possessed the 

 dependency of Meu-lo-sau-pu-lo , or Multan. It therefore comprised all the plains 

 of the Punjab, while the hilly districts were subject to Cashmere. The Cheka of 

 A. D. 650 had in fact the same limits as the kingdom of Lahore in A. D. 1050. 



f See Histoire de la vie de Hiouen Thsang, p. 459 ; and also Fo-kwe-ki, Appen- 

 dice, p. 381. 



