Lands of Asia layouts (Eng) 26.11.21

part iii | cultural and spiritual development
Furthermore, the new findings add three new characters to the alphabet of the
unknown script, extending it to 15 characters so far. Significantly, there are four
examples of a word beginning with a character that was either a very common vowel
or consonant in the language represented by this script. The available evidence
suggests that there were two types of script – rounded and geometric. As far as its
linguistic identity is concerned, we should consider the indisputable fact that Bactria
was the main centre of the unknown script, and that it was also one of three officially
recognised scripts of the Kushan state.
If this is correct, then the unknown script must reflect the language of a people
who made up a significant part of the population in Bactria and the Kushan state, and
who also played an important role in religious and administrative life, or it must be
the language of the ruling dynasty and a privileged segment of the population.
The bulk of the autochthonous population in Bactria were Bactrians, a people of
eastern Iranian origin whose script and language are reflected in many inscriptions,
including that of Surkh Kotal. Another significant but allochthonous ethnic group
in Bactria were Greeks, who were a privileged class in this area in the not-so-distant
past, and who probably survived during the Kushan period, and also had their own
language and script.
Indian inscriptions in Kharoshthi and Brahmi, which were used to write Prakrit
and Sanskrit, provide convincing evidence of the deep penetration of Indian ethnic
groups into the ethnosphere of Bactria. So we know that three major ethnic groups
of Bactria had their own scripts. Two of them – Bactrian and Kharoshthi – are used
in the inscriptions from Dasht-i Navur, and this makes sense as the first of these
reflected the language of Bactria’s indigenous population, while the second was
the language of colonies of Indian settlers and of the Buddhist religion that played
an extremely important role in life in the Kushan state. The third script then, must
reflect the language of one of the other major ethnic groups that inhabited Bactria.
In addition to the ethnic groups mentioned above, we should note three waves of
migration of nomadic peoples who came to Bactria: the Saka, Yuezhi, Asii, Pasiani,
Tokharians and Sacarauli.
Of these, the most important place in the history of Bactria was occupied by the
Yuezhi and Tokharians. The dominant role of the Tokharians is reflected in the name
Tokharistan – land of the Tokharians, which replaced or was used alongside the former
name Bactria, probably from the 1st century BC onwards. It is possible, however, that
the Yuezhi and Tokharians are one and the same ethnic group, as some researchers
suggest. The Yuezhi were immigrants from Inner Asia and a foreign ethnic group, and,
hence, had no connection with the autochthonous Bactrian language. However, to
date, we have no information about the origin of the Yuezhi language itself. No written
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