Lands of Asia layouts (Eng) 26.11.21

part iii | cultural and spiritual development
ink inscriptions on potsherds); Shahtepa (an incised inscription on a fragment of a
vessel rim); Dushanbe (an inscription on the rim of a khum).
In Southern Bactria, inscriptions have been found at the following major sites,
going from north to south: Dilberzhin (inscriptions in monumental script on stone
slabs and ostraca with inscriptions in black ink and graffiti inscriptions); Balkh (a
fragment of a clay vessel with a cursive inscription); modern Rui in the province
of Samangan (the royal archive of the kingdom of Rob); Surkh-Kotal (the most
extensive Bactrian inscription that we know of, consisting of 25 lines carved on a
limestone slab; two shorter copies of this inscription also carved on limestone slabs
have also been found here); Rabatak (a monumental inscription on a stone slab);
Uruzgan (rock inscriptions), Jagatu (rock inscriptions).
There have only been a few discoveries of Bactrian inscriptions on the territory
of Bactria-Tokharistan from the early medieval period. These are of legends on coins
found scattered between the Hissar Range in the north and the Hindu Kush in the
south. Coins with Bactrian character countermarks in Northern Tokharistan were
mainly produced in the Chaganian region, occasionally in Kuftan, and possibly in
other regions. In addition, copper coins with a square hole and a Bactrian cursive
legend were probably produced in Kobadian.
Among other specimens of Bactrian script, we should mention a sherd with an
inscription in black ink from Zangtepe and finds from Kala-i Kafirnigan. Coins with
Bactrian legends were produced in many areas of South Tokharistan, but also beyond
it, in Kabustan, Zabulistan, Gandhara and even in Northern India.
In contrast to those from the Kushan period, Bactrian inscriptions from the early
medieval period have been found beyond the borders of Bactria-Tokharistan proper.
Thus, Bactrian rock inscriptions have been found to the south of the Hindu Kush, in
Jagatu, to the west of Ghazni, and in Uruzgan (Afghanistan), as well as in the Tochi
River valley and at Shatial (Pakistan).
A Bactrian wall inscription in black ink, possibly made by natives of Chaganian,
was found in a palace building on the site of Afrasiab. The specimens of Bactrian
inscriptions that were found here are, for the most part, very short. They give the
names and titles of kings and gods on coins, and on gems the names of their owners
and their social status (e.g. ‘Varahran satrap’) and sometimes a religious formula. The
most interesting inscription, on a bulla, is in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, but
it is very difficult to make out. It has been translated by V. Livshits as reading: ‘Moon-
Kanishka, yabghu, son of the king of Hindustan’. W. Henning believed that Moon-
Kanishka was the full name of the great Kushan king, which he bore before ascending
the throne while still a prince of Tokharistan. Inscriptions on vessels and potsherds,
or ostraca, are mostly hard to read because they are so fragmentary. They contain
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