Eukratides II possible Sogdian imitation

Eucratides II (

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece 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 ...

: ) was a

Greco-Bactrian The Bactrian Kingdom, known to historians as the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom or simply Greco-Bactria, was a Hellenistic-era Greek state, and along with the Indo-Greek Kingdom, the easternmost part of the Hellenistic world in Central Asia and the India ...

king of the 2nd century BC who was a successor, and probably a son, of

Eucratides I Eucratides I the Great ( Koinē Greek: , ''Eúkratides Mégas'') (reigned 172/171–145 BC) was one of the most important Greco-Bactrian kings. Eucratides overthrew the Euthydemid dynasty and restored the Diodotids to power. He fought agains ...

. It seems likely that Eucratides II ruled for a relatively short time after the murder of his namesake, until he was dethroned in the dynastic civil war caused by the same murder, since

Justin Justin may refer to: People * Justin (name), including a list of persons with the given name Justin * Justin (historian), a Latin historian who lived under the Roman Empire * Justin I (c. 450–527), or ''Flavius Iustinius Augustus'', Eastern Rom ...

reports: :"As Eucratides returned from India, he was killed on the way back by his son, whom he had associated to his rule, and who, without hiding his patricide, as if he didn't kill a father but an enemy, ran with his chariot over the blood of his father, and ordered the corpse to be left without a sepulture" Justin 41.6 Justin 41.6
/ref> During his earlier years, Eucratides II may have been a co-regent of his father: on his later coins he adds the title ''Soter'' (Saviour), which could be an indication that he now ruled in his own right. Soon after Eucratides' II death, the last Bactrian king

Heliocles I Heliocles I ( grc, Ἡλιοκλῆς, Helioklēs; reigned 145–120 BCE) was a Greco-Bactrian king, brother and successor of Eucratides the Great, and considered (along with his co-ruler and son/nephew Heliocles II) the last Greek king to reign ...

(probably another member of the same Diodotid dynasty) was defeated by the

Yuezhi The Yuezhi (;) were an ancient people first described in Chinese histories as nomadic pastoralists living in an arid grassland area in the western part of the modern Chinese province of Gansu, during the 1st millennium BC. After a major defeat ...

tribes, who expelled the Greek kings from Bactria.

References

* ''The Shape of Ancient Thought. Comparative studies in Greek and Indian Philosophies'' by Thomas McEvilley (Allworth Press and the School of Visual Arts, 2002) * ''Buddhism in Central Asia'' by B. N. Puri (Motilal Banarsidass Pub, January 1, 2000) * ''The Greeks in Bactria and India'' by W.W. Tarn, Cambridge University Press.

External links

Le Roi Eucratide II de Bactriane
{{DEFAULTSORT:Eucratides 02 Greco-Bactrian kings 2nd-century BC rulers in Asia Year of death unknown Year of birth unknown Diodotid dynasty

See also

References

External links