Indo-Parthian Kingdom

The Indo-Parthian kingdom was the easternmost offshoot of the Parthian world, a dynasty of Parthian satraps' descendants who carved a realm in the Punjab and the Indus valley. Its founder Gondophares, whose name means glory-bearer, broke from Parthian overlordship in the early first century AD and made his capital at Taxila, the ancient university city, ruling from Kabul to the sea. The kingdom's coins tell its mixed nature: Greek legends for the cities, Kharosthi for the bazaars, Parthian titles for the court, and images of Nike beside Shiva. Through its ports passed the Indo-Roman trade in pepper, muslins and ivory; through its monasteries passed the Buddhism of Gandhara, whose sculptors, under Indo-Parthian and then Kushan patronage, gave the Buddha his first human face in the flowing robes of Apollo. Christian tradition remembers the court differently: the apocryphal Acts of Thomas sends the apostle to the palace of King Gundaphorus to build him a palace in heaven, and Thomas Christians of India still count Gondophares among their witnesses. The dynasty lasted some two centuries, weakened by Saka kinsmen and Sasanian pressure, until the Kushans absorbed Taxila in the early third century and the Indo-Parthian name faded from the coins.