He was the founder of the famous dynasty of the Arsacidæ. As Mr. Gardner1 observes, the "so-called history of Parthia is really the history of Central Asia under the Arsacidæ.”

After a reign of two years he was killed in battle, leaving his kingdom to his brother Tiridates, who was the real founder of the Parthian power. The fifth king of this dynasty was Mithridates (B.C. 190), who extended his conquests to such a degree that, according to Justin, his sway included the Himalayas and the Euphrates.2 He also compelled Eucratides, the powerful king of Bactria, who had come to the throne about B.C. 170, to cede certain districts of his kingdom.

After a glorious reign he died about B.C. 140, and was succeeded by his brother Phraates. The Syrian Empire of the Seleucidæ was fast falling to pieces, and Parthia was never again invaded by the Greeks. But a more terrible foe was approaching from the East, for it now came into collision with a Scythian band, called "Su" or "Se" in the Chinese annals, which in the second century B.C. had overrun the provinces bordering the Jaxartes. They are identical with the Sacæ of classical writers, and were afterwards known in Upper India as the Sakas. Phraates summoned a band of these savages to aid him against the Syrian Antiochus. Arriving at the scene of action too late to be of service in the campaign, they turned against him, defeated his army and slew him.

9. 2.

5

He was succeeded by his nephew Artabanus II., who

1 Parthian Coinage, Numismata Orientalia, vol. i. p. 2. Strabo, xi.

2 Justin, xii. 6: "Imperiumque parthorum a monte Caucaso multis populis indicionem redactis usque flumen Euphratem protulit."

3 Ibid. xlii. I.

⚫ Gardner, ibid. P. 6. Gardner, ibid. p. 6.

after a brief reign fell in battle against the Thogari,1 mentioned by Strabo as one of the four great Saka tribes. His son Mithridates II., justly distinguished by the appellation “Great,” revived the fading glories of the Parthian Empire. He commenced his reign by administering several crushing defeats to the Sakas, from whom he wrested the greater portion of Bactria. But he was destined to meet a foe more worthy of his steel, and finally to submit after a lifelong struggle. The Romans had entered on the career of foreign conquest which seems inevitable in the case of a powerful republic. Greece was theirs, and they had planted their eagles in Asia Minor.

Between B.C. 88 and 63 Mithridates waged three wars of extreme ferocity against the future conquerors of the world, and inspired them with a dread which they had not felt since the invasion of Hannibal. Not till the latter year did this great monarch acknowledge the supreme might of Rome, and then his indomitable spirit forbade him to sink to the condition of tributary. Defeated by Pompey on the Euphrates, he fled to the Caucasian Bosphorus, and was planning fuller resistance when the rebellion of his son rendered his schemes nugatory. He slew himself in despair, leaving a reputation which still echoes in the Crimea and Northern Caucasus.

From the period down to A.D. 226 the history of Parthia is one of continual struggle and crime, which finally exhausted the emperor's strength and rendered it an easy prey to a Roman invader.

1 See Note I at p. 6 of Chap. iii.

2 Strabo, xi. 8. 2.

3 This sentiment finds many echoes in Latin literature. Cf. Odes and Epistles of Horace, passim. It is curious to note the identity between the tactics of the Parthians and those of the hordes of Chingiz and Timur. The usual charge of bad faith is brought by the Romans against their terrible enemies.

4 The Straits of Yenekale,

CHAPTER III

THE HUNS AND THE YUE-CHI

IT is to Chinese sources that we must turn for an account of the tribes which overthrew Græco-Bactrian rule, and were a constant thorn in the side of the Parthian Empire. These sources, with faint sidelights thrown on an obscure period by allusions to be found in classic authors, enable us to bridge a gap of several centuries replete with events which exercised a lasting influence on the history of Central Asia.

The Chow dynasty ruled from B.C. 1122 to B.C. 250.1 After its fall China split up into a vast number of nearly independent principalities, and the reigning sovereign enjoyed but little power. The Tsin succeeded in gaining the foremost rank as feudatories, and finally restored the authority of the central power. Their aim was not achieved without a desperate struggle with their rivals. In the course of the resulting civil war Tsin Chi Hwang-ti began his reign. He was the Louis XI. of the Chinese monarchy, and brought force and stratagem by turns to bear on the task of restoring the imperial prestige.2

1 The three great reformers Lao-tse, Kung-fu-tse (Confucius), and Meng-tse (Mencius) flourished under the princes of this dynasty.

2 The greatest calamity which this ruthless despot inflicted on his country was the wholesale destruction of literature which he ordered, in view of keeping his people in ignorance. This atrocious measure was attended by the slaughter of many learned men. Cf. Legge, Analects of Confucius, p. 6.

When he found himself master at home, he turned his attention to the task of protecting his frontier from aggressors. Of these, the Hiung-nu, a Tartar tribe whose habitat was Eastern Mongolia, were the most troublesome. He carried the war into the enemy's camp by despatching an army across the great Gobi Desert, with orders to establish a strong place at Hami.1 In B.C. 250 he commenced a work which had a more lasting effect in repressing their invasion. This was the Great Wall of China, which starts from the Shan-hi Pass and ends at the Chin-Yu barriers, a distance of not less than 1500 miles. The Hiung-nu, like their kinsmen the Mongols of Chingiz and of Timur, fought on horseback, and their plan of campaign was simply a succession of raids followed by speedy retreats. This stupendous barrier intimidated them, and turned westwards the tide of their migration. Thus the Great Wall, which it is the fashion to decry as a monument of misplaced labour, was a most important factor in the history of Central Asia. At this epoch the Sakas were settled in Hexapolis, to the east of the Pamirs; while the Usuns dwelt on the southern side of Lake Lob, separated from the Sakas by the Uïghūrs. About B.C. 300 the empire of the Yué-Chi, who were a branch of the Tung-nu, or Eastern Tartars, extended most probably from the Muztagh Mountains on the north to the Kuen-lun Mountains on the south, and from the Upper Hoang-ho in Shan-si on the east to Koché and Khotan on the west.3

About B.C. 200 a war broke out between the Tung-nu and the Hiung-nu (the Western Tartars or Huns), their neighbours. Mothé, the chief of these latter, falling on

1 Also called Khamil, a town about 700 miles east of Kulja.

2 According to Richthofen, the Yué-Chi were of Tibetan stock, but Vambéry and Gerard de Realle assert that they were Turks. Their nidus was to the north-east of Tangut.

3 Cunningham, Survey of India, vol. ii. p. 62.

the Eastern Tartars unawares, utterly defeated them and drove the Yué-Chi from their kingdom. The latter fled to the banks of the Ili River, while Mothé pushed his conquests as far as the Volga on the west and the border provinces of China eastwards. The Emperor Kao-tsu (B.C. 202-194), founder of the famous Han dynasty, who had achieved the subjugation of the whole of China, was alarmed at the progress of Mothé, and marched against him. His troops were, however, surrounded by Mothé's colossal hordes in the north of the province of Shan-si, and only escaped destruction by the employment of a ruse.1 On the departure of the Chinese. army Mothé set out for Tartary. For upwards of fifty years the power of Hiung-nu sustained no check. They continued to press down on the Yué-Chi, who, after suffering a further crushing defeat, broke into separate hordes. The lesser division, or "Little Yué-Chi," passed into Tibet. The "Great Yué-Chi's" first movement was westwards to the banks of the Ili, but finding the Usun too strong for them, they wandered in a southerly direction, and finally descended upon Kāshghar, Yarkand, and Khotan, whence they displaced the Sakas (B.C. 163). The latter, on their expulsion from Soghdiana, invaded Bactria, and from this period until the fall of the GræcoBactrian kingdom the Greeks had to deal with both Sakas and Parthians. It would seem that the latter were alternately friends and foes. This intercourse possibly accounts for the Parthian characteristics found on the early Saka coins of India.2

The Sakas were driven towards the Pamirs and the Tien-shan. One branch of them fled to Zungaria, while

1 Ct. d'Herbelot, Bib. Orient. vol. vi. p. 10; and Boulger, Hist. of China, p. 11.

2 Cf. Rapson, Indian Coins, in Grundriss der Indo-Arischen Philologie p. 7.