Apollophanes Soter maharajasa tratarasa Aplaphanasa

Apollophanes Soter ( Greek: ;

epithet An epithet (, ), also byname, is a descriptive term (word or phrase) known for accompanying or occurring in place of a name and having entered common usage. It has various shades of meaning when applied to seemingly real or fictitious people, di ...

means "the Saviour"; reigned c. 35 – 25 BCE) was an Indo-Greek king in the area of eastern and central

Punjab Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising ...

in modern

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

and

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...

Rule

Little is known about him, except for some of his remaining coins. The dating is Osmund Bopearachchi's, but R. C. Senior suggests approximately the same dates. Earlier scholars, such as Professor Ahmed Hasan Dani, W.W. Tarn and A.K. Narain dated Apollophanes considerably earlier, but the style and finding places of his coins make it clear that he belonged to the last line of eastern Indo-Greek kings, not long before they were overcome completely by pressure from the

Indo-Scythians Indo-Scythians (also called Indo-Sakas) were a group of nomadic Iranian peoples of Scythian origin who migrated from Central Asia southward into modern day Pakistan and Northwestern India from the middle of the 2nd century BCE to the 4th centur ...

. He may have been a relative of Apollodotus II Soter since both kings share the epithet ''Soter'' (Saviour), have names related to Apollo and use Pallas Athene as their reverse.

Coins of Apollophanes

Apollophanes issued a few debased silver drachms of the type seen above, struck with a single monogram and of little artistic quality. He seems to have been an insignificant local ruler. Apollophanes wears what appears to be a

Macedon Macedonia (; grc-gre, Μακεδονία), also called Macedon (), was an ancient kingdom on the periphery of Archaic and Classical Greece, and later the dominant state of Hellenistic Greece. The kingdom was founded and initially ruled by ...

ian helmet of the type seen on the Alexander Mosaic which he was the last Indo-Greek ruler to use. Apollophanes used exclusively a single "boxy" mint-mark, in keeping with late Indo-Greek kings.JSTOR article
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References

* ''The Greeks in Bactria and India'', W.W. Tarn, Cambridge University Press. * ''The Bactrian and Indus Greeks'', Ahmed Hasan Dani, Lahore Museum * ''The Indo-Greeks - Revisited and Supplemented'', A.K. Narain, BR Publishing Corporation * ''Monnaies Gréco-Bactriennes et Indo-Grecques'', Osmund Bopearachchi, Bibliothèque Nationale de France. {{DEFAULTSORT:Apollophanes Indo-Greek kings 1st-century BC rulers in Asia

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Coins of Apollophanes

See also

References

References