The Kathaioi, it would appear from the text, inhabited the regions lying to the east of the Hydraôtês. Some writers, however, as Strabo informs us (XV. i. 30), placed their country in the tract between the Hydaspês and Akesinês, but this view is manifestly wrong. They are described by ancient authors as one of the most powerful nations of India. Their very name indicates their warlike propensities and predominance, for if it is not identical with that of the military caste, Kshatriya, it is at least a modified form of that word. Arrian subsequently (vi. 15) mentions a tribe of independent Indians whose name is a still closer transliteration of Kshatriya, the Xathroi, whose territories lay between the Indus and the lower course of the Akesinês. Strabo (XV. i. 30) notices some of the peculiar manners and customs of the Kathaians, such as infanticide, and Sati. Lassen has pointed out that their name is connected with that of the Kattia, a nomadic race scattered at intervals through the plains of the Panjâb, but supposed to be the aborigines of the country and of Kolarian descent. Their name occurs in that of the province of Kâthiawâr, which now comprises the province of Gujerat.
Note M.—Sangala
Sir E. H. Bunbury, referring to the uncertainty of the identifications of the tribes and cities of the Panjâb mentioned by Alexander’s historians, says: “While the general course of his march must have followed approximately the same line of route that has been frequented in all ages from the banks of the Indus to those of the Beas, his expeditions against the various warlike tribes that refused submission to his arms led him into frequent excursions to the right and left of his main direction. And with regard to these localities we have a general clue to guide us. The most important of these sites to determine would be that of Sangala, the capital of the Cathaeans, which, according to the narrative of Arrian, was situated between the Hydraotes and the Hyphasis. Hence it was placed by Burnes at Lahore, and by others at Umritsir. But on the other hand there are not wanting strong reasons for identifying Sangala with the Sakala of Indian writers, and this was certainly situated to the west of the Hydraotes, between that river and the Acesines” (Hist. of Anc. Geog. pp. 444, 445). This was the view of General Cunningham, who, taking Śâkala or Sâkala (the Sagala of Ptolemy’s Geography) to be the name in Sanskrit of the place which the Greeks called Sangala, found a site for it at Sânglawâla-Tiba, a small rocky hill with ruins upon it and with a large swamp at its base, and situated between the Râvi (Hydraôtês) and the Chenâb (Akesinês) at a distance of about sixty miles to the west of Lahore. This was no doubt the site of the Śâkala of Sanskrit writers and of the She-kie-lo of the Chinese pilgrim Hwen Thsiang, who visited the place in 630 A.D. But it cannot have been the site of the Sangala of the Greeks, for, in the first place, according to the testimony of all the historians, that city lay between the Hydraôtês and the Hyphasis, and was attacked by Alexander after he had crossed the former river. To meet this objection Cunningham assumes that Alexander must have recrossed the Hydraôtês on hearing that the Kathaians had risen in his rear. His thus turning aside from the direction of his march to make his rear secure is quite consistent with his usual practice, but the historians say nothing from which it can possibly be inferred that on this occasion he made any retrograde movement. But again philology as well as history is adverse to this identification, for, as has lately been shown by M. Sylvain Lévi (Journal Asiatique, series viii. vol. xv. pp. 237-239), Sangala, in accordance with the rules of transcription, must be taken to represent not Sâkala, but Sâmkala. Now, just as in Diodôros and Curtius we find Sangala mentioned in connection with a king called Sôphytês, so in an Appendix to Pânini’s Grammar, called the Gana-pâtha, Sâmkala is mentioned in connection with Saubhuta, which, in accordance with the rules of transcription and the Greek practice of designating Indian rulers after their territories, is evidently the name of the country over which Sôphytês ruled. This country, which was rich and prosperous, as its very name implies, lay between the Hydraôtês and the Hyphasis, probably in the district of Amritsar and towards the hills. Arrian in his narrative of the campaign between these two rivers makes no mention of Sôphytês, or, as he calls him, Sôpeithes, but he afterwards refers to a king of this name whose dominions lay between the Hydaspês and Akesinês. Strabo was aware of the discrepancy of the accounts as to where the dominions of the Kathaians and King Sôphytês were situated.
Note N.—Alexander’s Altars on the Hyphasis
These altars are mentioned by Pliny, who says (vi. 21): “The Hyphasis was the limit of the marches of Alexander, who, however, crossed it, and dedicated altars on the further bank.” Pliny stands alone in placing these altars on the left bank of the river. The historians all place them on the right bank. Philostratos states that Apollonios of Tyana on his journey into India in the second century of our aera, found the altars still subsisting and their inscriptions still legible. Plutarch affirms that in his days they were held in much veneration by the Praisians, whose kings, he says, were in the habit of crossing the Ganges every year to offer sacrifices in the Grecian manner upon them. It would, however, be unsafe to place much credit in either of these statements. The altars have been sought for in recent times, but not the slightest vestige of them has been discovered. Masson and some other modern writers place them on the Gharra (the united stream of the Vipaśâ and the Śatadru (or Satlej), but this view, while otherwise exposed to serious objections, is upset by the fact alone that in ancient times the two rivers united at a point forty miles below their present junction. As Pliny (vi. 21) gives the distance from the Hyphasis to the Hesidrus (Satlej) along the Royal Road at 169 miles, it is evident that the altars must have been situated at a point high above the junction of these two rivers. V. de Saint-Martin is inclined to think that the altars may have been situated near a chain of heights met with in ascending the Beiâs, and known locally under the name of the Sekandar-giri, that is, “Alexander’s mountain.” These heights are at no great distance from Râjagiri, a small and obscure place, but supposed to represent Râjagriha mentioned in the Râmâyana as the capital of a line of princes called the Aśvapati (or Assapati in Prakrit) who governed the Kekaya, or, as Arrian calls them in his Indika, the Kêkeoi. Lassen, followed by Saint-Martin, identified Sôpeithes as belonging to the line of princes indicated. The identification has been superseded by a better, but Saint-Martin’s argument, as far as it concerns the position of the altars, is not thereby affected. Sir E. H. Bunbury considers that the point where Alexander erected the twelve altars cannot be regarded as determined within even approximate limits. It appears probable, he thinks, that they were situated at some distance above the confluence of the two rivers, and not very far from the point where the Beas emerges from the mountain ranges. We learn indeed, he adds, that throughout his advance Alexander kept as near as he could to the mountains; partly from the idea that he would thus find the great rivers more easily passable, as being nearer their sources; partly from an exaggerated impression of the sterile and desert character of the plains farther south (Hist. of Anc. Geog. p. 444).
Note O.—Voyage down the Hydaspês and Akesinês to the Indus
From the point of embarkation at Nikaia (Mong) to the confluence of the united streams of the Panjâb with the Indus, the distance in a straight line may be reckoned at about 300 miles. Alexander in descending to this confluence had no sooner left the dominions of Pôros than he was engaged in a constant succession of hostilities with the riparian tribes. He had no intention of leaving India as a fugitive. He must depart as a conqueror and master of all wherever he appeared. He had no wish, therefore, even had it been possible, to drop quietly down stream to the ocean. He must demand submission to his authority from all the tribes he might encounter on his way, and, if this were refused, enforce it at the sword’s point. These tribes were the bravest of the brave in India—the very ancestors of the Rajputras, or Rajputs, whose splendid military qualities have spread their fame throughout the world. Such of these tribes as inhabited the fertile regions adjacent to the rivers seemed to have settled in towns and villages and to have practised agriculture, while those that tenanted the deserts which extended far eastward into the interior led a half-wandering pastoral life, and subsisted as much on the produce of rapine as on the produce of their flocks and herds. They were all proudly jealous of their independence, and owned no authority but that of their proper chiefs. Though they were separated into distinct tribes, which were almost perpetually at feud, they were still able when confronted with a common danger to combine into formidable confederacies. In all times they have opposed to invasion a vigorous and sometimes a desperate resistance (v. Saint-Martin, Étude, p. 113).
Note P.—The Malloi and Oxydrakai
The names of these two warlike tribes are very frequently conjoined in the narratives of the historians. In Sanskrit works they appear as the Mâlava and the Kshudraka, and a verse of the Mahâbhârata combines them in a single appellation, Kshudrakamâlava. They are mentioned in combination by Pânini also as two Bahîka people of the north-west. Arrian (Indika, c. iv.) places the Oxydrakai on the Hydaspês above its confluence with the Akesinês. It is doubtful, however, that this was their real position. Bunbury inclines to think that they lay on the east or left bank of the Satlej—the province of Bahawalpur—and that they may very well have extended as far as the junction of the Satlej with the Indus and the neighbourhood of Uchh. General Cunningham, he adds, is alone in placing the Oxydracae to the north of the Malli. That author has, however, the Indika to support his view. Their name in the classics appears in various forms, Strabo and Stephanos Byz. calling them Hydrakai, Pliny Sydracae, and Diodôros Syrakousai. Strabo says they were reported to be the descendants of Bacchos because the vine grew in their country, and because their kings displayed great pomp in setting out on their warlike expeditions after the Bacchic manner (XV. i. 8). They are no doubt to be identified with the Śudras, whose name in early times did not denote a caste, as it did afterwards, but a tribe of aborigines, or, at all events, a tribe of non-Aryan origin. The final ka in the Greek form of their name is a common Sanskrit suffix to ethnic names given or withheld at random. The single combat between Dioxippos and a Macedonian bravo called Horratas took place after a great banquet at which Alexander entertained the envoys of the Oxydrakai.