Within
Buddhist mythology
The Buddhist traditions have created and maintained a vast body of mythological literature. The central myth of Buddhism is the life of the Buddha. This is told in relatively realistic terms in the earliest texts, and was soon elaborated into ...
, Sadashkana (
Kharosthi
The Kharoṣṭhī script, also spelled Kharoshthi (Kharosthi: ), was an ancient Indo-Iranian script used by various Aryan peoples in north-western regions of the Indian subcontinent, more precisely around present-day northern Pakistan and ...
: 𐨮𐨿𐨐𐨞𐨆𐨯𐨡 ', ') according to the gold plate inscription of Senavarman, mentions Sadashkana as the
Devaputra (son of god), son of
maharaja rayatiraya Kujula Kataphsa (
Kujula Kadphises):
:''"Maharaja rayatiraya Kuyula Kataphsaputra Sadashkano devaputra"''
:"The son of god Sadashkano, son of the Great king and king of kings, Kujula Kaphises"
He was the son of the founder of Kushan empire and his brother was
Sadaṣkaṇa Within Buddhist mythology, Sadashkana (Kharosthi: 𐨮𐨿𐨐𐨞𐨆𐨯𐨡 ', ') according to the gold plate inscription of Senavarman, mentions Sadashkana as the Deva (Buddhism), Devaputra (son of god), son of maharaja rayatiraya Kujula Kata ...
, their next generation was
Kanishka. The Chinese ''
Book of Later Han
The ''Book of the Later Han'', also known as the ''History of the Later Han'' and by its Chinese name ''Hou Hanshu'' (), is one of the Twenty-Four Histories and covers the history of the Han dynasty from 6 to 189 CE, a period known as the Later ...
'' 後漢書 chronicles gives an account of the formation of the
Kushan empire
The Kushan Empire ( grc, Βασιλεία Κοσσανῶν; xbc, Κυϸανο, ; sa, कुषाण वंश; Brahmi: , '; BHS: ; xpr, 𐭊𐭅𐭔𐭍 𐭇𐭔𐭕𐭓, ; zh, 貴霜 ) was a syncretic empire, formed by the Yuezhi, i ...
based on a report made by the Chinese general
Ban Yong to the Chinese Emperor c. 125 AD:
The Kushans were one of five branches of the
Yuezhi confederation,
a possibly
Iranian or
Tocharian,
["They are, by almost unanimous opinion, Indo-Europeans, probably the most oriental of those who occupied the steppes." Roux, p.90] nomadic people who migrated from
Gansu
Gansu (, ; alternately romanized as Kansu) is a province in Northwest China. Its capital and largest city is Lanzhou, in the southeast part of the province.
The seventh-largest administrative district by area at , Gansu lies between the Tibet ...
and settled in ancient
Bactria
Bactria (; Bactrian: , ), or Bactriana, was an ancient region in Central Asia in Amu Darya's middle stream, stretching north of the Hindu Kush, west of the Pamirs and south of the Gissar range, covering the northern part of Afghanistan, southwe ...
.
[ ]Ban Gu
Ban Gu (AD32–92) was a Chinese historian, politician, and poet best known for his part in compiling the ''Book of Han'', the second of China's 24 dynastic histories. He also wrote a number of '' fu'', a major literary form, part prose ...
's '' Book of Han'' tells us the Kushans (Kuei-shuang) divided up Bactria in 128 BC. Fan Ye's ''Book of Later Han
The ''Book of the Later Han'', also known as the ''History of the Later Han'' and by its Chinese name ''Hou Hanshu'' (), is one of the Twenty-Four Histories and covers the history of the Han dynasty from 6 to 189 CE, a period known as the Later ...
'' "relates how the chief of the Kushans, Ch'iu-shiu-ch'ueh (the Kujula Kadphises of coins), founded by means of the submission of the other Yueh-chih clans the Kushan Empire, known to the Greeks and Romans under the name of Empire of the Indo-Scythians."
See also
* Indo-Greek kingdom
* Kushan empire
The Kushan Empire ( grc, Βασιλεία Κοσσανῶν; xbc, Κυϸανο, ; sa, कुषाण वंश; Brahmi: , '; BHS: ; xpr, 𐭊𐭅𐭔𐭍 𐭇𐭔𐭕𐭓, ; zh, 貴霜 ) was a syncretic empire, formed by the Yuezhi, i ...
References
*"Ancient Indian inscriptions", S.R. Goyal, p. 92-93
Kushan Empire
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