Alexandria in the Caucasus ( ''Alexándreia''; medieval Kapisa, modern

Bagram Bagram (; Pashto/) is a town and seat in Bagram District in Parwan Province of Afghanistan, about 60 kilometers north of the capital Kabul. It is the site of an ancient city located at the junction of the Ghorband and Panjshir Valley, near t ...

) was a colony of

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon (; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), most commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip ...

. It was one of many colonies designated with the name "Alexandria". He founded the

colony A colony is a territory subject to a form of foreign rule, which rules the territory and its indigenous peoples separated from the foreign rulers, the colonizer, and their ''metropole'' (or "mother country"). This separated rule was often orga ...

at an important junction of communications in the southern foothills of the

Hindu Kush The Hindu Kush is an mountain range in Central Asia, Central and South Asia to the west of the Himalayas. It stretches from central and eastern Afghanistan into northwestern Pakistan and far southeastern Tajikistan. The range forms the wester ...

mountains, in the country of the

Paropamisadae Paropamisadae or Parapamisadae () was a satrapy of the Alexandrian Empire in modern Afghanistan and Pakistan, which largely coincided with the Achaemenid province of Parupraesanna. It consisted of the districts of Sattagydia (Bannu basin), Ga ...

. In Classical times, the Hindu Kush mountains were also designated as the "Caucasus", specifically as "Caucasus Indicus" (

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

: Καύκασος Ινδικός) in parallel to their Western equivalent, the

Caucasus Mountains The Caucasus Mountains * * Azerbaijani: , * * * * * * * * * * * is a mountain range at the intersection of Asia and Europe. Stretching between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, they are surrounded by the Caucasus region ...

between

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

and

Asia Asia ( , ) is the largest continent in the world by both land area and population. It covers an area of more than 44 million square kilometres, about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which ...

Alexander the Great

Alexander populated the city with 7,000 Macedonians, 3,000 mercenaries and thousands of natives (according to Curtius VII.3.23), or some 7,000 natives and 3,000 non-military camp followers and a number of Greek mercenaries (Diodorus, XVII.83.2), in March 329 BC. He had also built forts in what is now

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the Durand Line, east and south, Iran to the Afghanistan–Iran borde ...

, at the foot of the Hindu Kush, replacing

fort A fortification (also called a fort, fortress, fastness, or stronghold) is a military construction designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from La ...

s erected in much the same place by

Persia Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

king King is a royal title given to a male monarch. A king is an Absolute monarchy, absolute monarch if he holds unrestricted Government, governmental power or exercises full sovereignty over a nation. Conversely, he is a Constitutional monarchy, ...

Cyrus the Great Cyrus II of Persia ( ; 530 BC), commonly known as Cyrus the Great, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire. Achaemenid dynasty (i. The clan and dynasty) Hailing from Persis, he brought the Achaemenid dynasty to power by defeating the Media ...

c. 500 BC, Alexandria being in fact a refoundation of an Achaemenid settlement called Kapisa. The

deity A deity or god is a supernatural being considered to be sacred and worthy of worship due to having authority over some aspect of the universe and/or life. The ''Oxford Dictionary of English'' defines ''deity'' as a God (male deity), god or god ...

of the city seems to have been

Zeus Zeus (, ) is the chief deity of the List of Greek deities, Greek pantheon. He is a sky father, sky and thunder god in ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, who rules as king of the gods on Mount Olympus. Zeus is the child ...

, as suggested by

coins A coin is a small object, usually round and flat, used primarily as a medium of exchange or legal tender. They are standardized in weight, and produced in large quantities at a mint in order to facilitate trade. They are most often issued by ...

of the

Greco-Bactrian The Greco-Bactrian Kingdom () was a Greek state of the Hellenistic period located in Central-South Asia. The kingdom was founded by the Seleucid satrap Diodotus I Soter in about 256 BC, and continued to dominate Central Asia until its fall a ...

king Eucratides.

Indo-Greek capital

Alexandria of the Caucasus was one of the capitals of the

Indo-Greek The Indo-Greek Kingdom, also known as the Yavana Kingdom, was a Hellenistic period, Hellenistic-era Ancient Greece, Greek kingdom covering various parts of modern-day Afghanistan, Pakistan and northwestern India. The term "Indo-Greek Kingdom" ...

kings (180 BC – AD 10). For example, it was ruled by the king

Hermaeus Hermaeus Soter (, ''Hermaîos ho Sōtḗr,'' meaning "Hermaeus the Saviour") was a Western Indo-Greek king of the Eucratid dynasty, who ruled the territory of Paropamisadae in the Hindu-Kush region, with his capital in Alexandria of the Caucasus ( ...

who is particularly associated with the city. During the reign of

Menander I Menander I Soter (, ; ), sometimes called Menander the Great, was an Indo-Greek king (reigned /155Bopearachchi (1998) and (1991), respectively. The first date is estimated by Osmund Bopearachchi and R. C. Senior, the other Boperachchi –1 ...

the city was recorded as having a thriving

Buddhist Buddhism, also known as Buddhadharma and Dharmavinaya, is an Indian religion and List of philosophies, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha, a wandering teacher who lived in the 6th or ...

community, headed by

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

monks A monk (; from , ''monachos'', "single, solitary" via Latin ) is a man who is a member of a religious order and lives in a monastery. A monk usually lives his life in prayer and contemplation. The concept is ancient and can be seen in many reli ...

. The epic Sri Lankan poem ''

Mahāvaṃsa ''Mahāvaṃsa'' (Sinhala: මහාවංශ (Mahāvansha), Pali: ''මහාවංස (Mahāvaṃsa)'') is the meticulously kept historical chronicle of Sri Lanka until the period of Mahasena of Anuradhapura. It was written in the style of ...

'' mentions the Greek (

Pali Pāli (, IAST: pāl̤i) is a Classical languages of India, classical Middle Indo-Aryan languages, Middle Indo-Aryan language of the Indian subcontinent. It is widely studied because it is the language of the Buddhist ''Pali Canon, Pāli Can ...

: ''

Yona The word Yona in Pali and the Prakrits, and the analogue Yavana in Sanskrit, were used in Ancient India to designate Greek speakers. "Yona" and "Yavana" are transliterations of the Greek word for "Ionians" (), who were probably the first Gr ...

'', lit: "

Ionia Ionia ( ) was an ancient region encompassing the central part of the western coast of Anatolia. It consisted of the northernmost territories of the Ionian League of Greek settlements. Never a unified state, it was named after the Ionians who ...

n") Buddhist monk Mahadhammarakkhita (), who is said to have come from “Alasandra” (thought to be Alexandria of the Caucasus), with 30,000 monks for the foundation ceremony of the Maha Thupa at

Anuradhapura Anuradhapura (, ; , ) is a major city located in the north central plain of Sri Lanka. It is the capital city of North Central Province, Sri Lanka, North Central Province and the capital of Anuradhapura District. The city lies north of the cur ...

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, also known historically as Ceylon, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, separated from the Indian subcontinent, ...

: :From Alasanda the city of the Yonas came the thera (elder)

Mahadhammarakkhita with thirty thousand

bhikkhu A ''bhikkhu'' (, ) is an ordained male in Buddhist monasticism. Male, and female monastics (''bhikkhunī''), are members of the Sangha (Buddhist community). The lives of all Buddhist monastics are governed by a set of rules called the pratimok� ...

Archaeology

Some

archaeological Archaeology or archeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of Artifact (archaeology), artifacts, architecture, biofact (archaeology), biofacts or ecofacts, ...

evidence concerning Alexandria of the Caucasus was gathered by

Charles Masson Charles Masson (1800–1853) was the pseudonym of James Lewis, a British East India Company soldier, independent explorer and pioneering archaeologist and numismatist. He was the first European to discover the ruins of Harappa near Sahiwal in P ...

(1800–1853), providing insight into the history of that lost city. His findings include

coin A coin is a small object, usually round and flat, used primarily as a medium of exchange or legal tender. They are standardized in weight, and produced in large quantities at a mint in order to facilitate trade. They are most often issued by ...

s, rings, seals and other small objects. In the 1930s

Roman Ghirshman Roman Ghirshman (, ''Roman Mikhailovich Girshman''; October 3, 1895 – 5 September 1979) was a Ukrainian-born French archeologist who specialized in ancient Persia. Ghirshman spent nearly thirty years excavating ancient Persian archeologic ...

, while conducting excavations near

, found

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

ian and

Syria Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to Syria–Turkey border, the north, Iraq to Iraq–Syria border, t ...

n glassware, bronze statuettes, bowls, the Begram ivories and other objects including

statue A statue is a free-standing sculpture in which the realistic, full-length figures of persons or animals are carved or Casting (metalworking), cast in a durable material such as wood, metal or stone. Typical statues are life-sized or close to ...

s. This is an indication that Alexander's conquests opened

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

to imports from

the west West is a cardinal direction or compass point. West or The West may also refer to: Geography and locations Global context * The Western world * Western culture and Western civilization in general * The Western Bloc, countries allied with NAT ...

. Today the cities' remains feature a rectangular tell 500 by 200 metres in area and a nearby circular

citadel A citadel is the most fortified area of a town or city. It may be a castle, fortress, or fortified center. The term is a diminutive of ''city'', meaning "little city", because it is a smaller part of the city of which it is the defensive core. ...

about 3 km northeast of Bagram Airforce base. The tell lies beside the main road north and has been slightly damaged due to shelling during Afghan War of the 21st century.

Gallery

File:BegramMedallion.jpg, Begram medallion showing a young man wearing a

chlamys The chlamys (; genitive: ) was a type of ancient Greek cloak. It was worn by men for military and hunting purposes during the Classical, Hellenistic and later periods. By the time of the Byzantine Empire it was part of the state costume of the ...

; c. 1st century AD. File:BegramMedallion3.jpg, Begram medallion depicting a Greek soldier wearing a

Corinthian helmet The Corinthian helmet originated in ancient Greece and took its name from the city-state of Corinth. It was a helmet made of bronze which in its later styles covered the entire head and neck, with slits for the eyes and mouth. A large curved pro ...

; c. 1st century AD. File:Begram Alexander.jpg, Bronze statuette of Alexander the Great, from Begram. File:BegramAphrodite.jpg,

Aphrodite Aphrodite (, ) is an Greek mythology, ancient Greek goddess associated with love, lust, beauty, pleasure, passion, procreation, and as her syncretism, syncretised Roman counterpart , desire, Sexual intercourse, sex, fertility, prosperity, and ...

sculpture from Begram, c. 1st century AD, Plaster, National Museum of Afghanistan. File:Begram Harpocrates.jpg, Bronze statuette of

Harpocrates Harpocrates (, Phoenician language, Phoenician: 𐤇𐤓𐤐𐤊𐤓𐤈, romanized: ḥrpkrṭ, ''harpokratēs'') is the god of silence, secrets and confidentiality in the Hellenistic religion developed in History of Alexandria#Ptolemaic era ...

from Begram, 1-2nd century AD. Musée Guimet, Paris. File:BegramMedallion5.jpg, Begram medallion with

Eros and Psyche Cupid and Psyche is a story originally from ''Metamorphoses'' (also called ''The Golden Ass''), written in the 2nd century AD by Lucius Apuleius Madaurensis (or Platonicus). The tale concerns the overcoming of obstacles to the love between Psy ...

; c. 1st century AD. File:BegramMedallion4.jpg, Begram medallion, c. 1st century AD.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Alexandria On The Caucasus 329 BC Seleucid colonies Populated places established in the 4th century BC Cities founded by Alexander the Great Bactrian and Indian Hellenistic period Former populated places in Afghanistan Cities in Central Asia Hellenistic sites in Afghanistan Tells (archaeology) 320s BC establishments