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The Greek Experience of India: From Alexander to the Indo-Greeks
An exploration of how the Greeks reacted to and interacted with India from the third to first centuries BCE
When the Greeks and Macedonians in Alexander's army reached India in 326 BCE, they entered a new and strange world. They knew a few legends and travelers' tales, but their categories of thought were inadequate to encompass what they witnessed. The plants were unrecognizable, their properties unknown. The customs of the people were various and puzzling. While Alexander's conquest was brief, ending with his death in 323 BCE, the Greeks would settle in the Indian region for the next two centuries, forging an era of productive interactions between the two cultures. The Greek Experience of India explores the various ways that the Greeks reacted to and constructed life in India during this fruitful period.
From observations about botany and mythology to social customs, Richard Stoneman examines the surviving evidence of those who traveled to India. Most particularly, he offers a full and valuable look at Megasthenes, ambassador of the King Seleucus to Chandragupta Maurya, and provides a detailed discussion of Megasthenes' now-fragmentary book Indica. Stoneman considers the art, literature, and philosophy of the Indo-Greek kingdom and how cultural influences crossed in both directions, with the Greeks introducing their writing, coinage, and sculptural and architectural forms, while Greek craftsmen learned to work with new materials such as ivory and stucco and to probe the ideas of Buddhists and other ascetics.
Relying on an impressively wide variety of sources from the Indian subcontinent, The Greek Experience of India is a masterful account of the encounters between two remarkable civilizations.
When the Greeks and Macedonians in Alexander's army reached India in 326 BCE, they entered a new and strange world. They knew a few legends and travelers' tales, but their categories of thought were inadequate to encompass what they witnessed. The plants were unrecognizable, their properties unknown. The customs of the people were various and puzzling. While Alexander's conquest was brief, ending with his death in 323 BCE, the Greeks would settle in the Indian region for the next two centuries, forging an era of productive interactions between the two cultures. The Greek Experience of India explores the various ways that the Greeks reacted to and constructed life in India during this fruitful period.
From observations about botany and mythology to social customs, Richard Stoneman examines the surviving evidence of those who traveled to India. Most particularly, he offers a full and valuable look at Megasthenes, ambassador of the King Seleucus to Chandragupta Maurya, and provides a detailed discussion of Megasthenes' now-fragmentary book Indica. Stoneman considers the art, literature, and philosophy of the Indo-Greek kingdom and how cultural influences crossed in both directions, with the Greeks introducing their writing, coinage, and sculptural and architectural forms, while Greek craftsmen learned to work with new materials such as ivory and stucco and to probe the ideas of Buddhists and other ascetics.
Relying on an impressively wide variety of sources from the Indian subcontinent, The Greek Experience of India is a masterful account of the encounters between two remarkable civilizations.
560 pages, Paperback
Published June 8, 2021
19 people are currently reading
298 people want to read
About the author
Richard Stoneman
69 books19 followers"I was born just a few miles from Exeter and have been an Honorary Fellow in the department since 1996. I spent thirty years as a classics editor, most of those years for Routledge; since retiring from that role in 2006, and returning from London to live in Devon, I have been taking an active part in university affairs, including teaching, research and a planned conference.
The core of my research interests has been the continuity of the Greek world and Greek tradition up to the present day. I have written anthologies and travel guides reflecting this interest. Since the early 1980s the main focus of my research has been Alexander the Great, especially in later legend. I have recently participated in several international conferences on the Ancient Novel and on Philip and Alexander. I am currently writing a biography of Xerxes and a study of Megasthenes.
Besides Latin and Greek, my languages include fluent German and adequate French, Italian and Modern Greek. I am taking classes in Turkish and Persian.
I am also Chairman of Westminster Classic Tours (www.westminsterclassictours.com), a company which runs gület tours to classical sites around the Turkish coast and Greek Islands.
In 2009 I was appointed Consulting Editor in Classics to I.B. Tauris Publishers in London, and am actively seeking new authors for their classics programme, and for the series I edit, 'Understanding Classics'.
In 2010 I organised a conference at Exeter University, in conjunction with the Institute of Arab and islamic Studies, on 'The Alexander Romance in Persia and the East'. There were delegates from every continent."
The core of my research interests has been the continuity of the Greek world and Greek tradition up to the present day. I have written anthologies and travel guides reflecting this interest. Since the early 1980s the main focus of my research has been Alexander the Great, especially in later legend. I have recently participated in several international conferences on the Ancient Novel and on Philip and Alexander. I am currently writing a biography of Xerxes and a study of Megasthenes.
Besides Latin and Greek, my languages include fluent German and adequate French, Italian and Modern Greek. I am taking classes in Turkish and Persian.
I am also Chairman of Westminster Classic Tours (www.westminsterclassictours.com), a company which runs gület tours to classical sites around the Turkish coast and Greek Islands.
In 2009 I was appointed Consulting Editor in Classics to I.B. Tauris Publishers in London, and am actively seeking new authors for their classics programme, and for the series I edit, 'Understanding Classics'.
In 2010 I organised a conference at Exeter University, in conjunction with the Institute of Arab and islamic Studies, on 'The Alexander Romance in Persia and the East'. There were delegates from every continent."
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
June 29, 2020
This book was published by the Princeton University Press, but just from the quality of the work it becomes obvious very quickly that Stoneman is a British classicist. If I'd known I wouldn't have bothered; when traditional Classical Studies began to be outpaced so dramatically by archaeology and linguistics in the 19th century, most continental universities responded by just making them all share office space and letting their sense of shame pull them up to standard, but the British famously never developed one of those, so they just dug in their heels and started sucking tremendously—and they still do to this day.
Still, our main source of information of the Greek view of anything—certainly by the Hellenistic period—is their copious literary output, so you might expect that a book like this would be sufficiently up a philologist's street that even an Englishman could pull it off. As it turns out: not so. Though Stoneman provides enough keywords for an interested reader to know where to begin their own research (mainly the names of Ctesias and Megasthenes), he only ever engages with any texts themselves in the most roundabout way, citing other people's opinions with wild disregard for the credibility of those opinions and creating a chronological and thematic muddle that takes up a lot of paper but contains stunningly little substance. When he does try to provide historical context for those Greek authors, it's immediately apparent he's fundamentally incapable of interpreting the work of actual historians and archaeologists, being unable even to begin to distinguish mainstream or plausible claims from outright fringe or at least very speculative ones (possibly the low point of this is when he casually claims Berossus wrote about Noah, which was a fashionable confusion in the 1600s), and though it would be going too far to accuse Stoneman of nostalgia for the British Empire, it's certainly true that being steeped in that environment for so long leads him to project an anachronistic racism onto both the Greeks and the Indians.
Most impressive to me, though, is the etymological trivia he peppers throughout the book, possibly in an attempt to demonstrate that philologists don't have to play second fiddle to linguists: as far as I can tell, every single etymology given is wrong in some meaningful way. If I hadn't already interacted with people like Stoneman before, I'd think the entire thing an elaborate prank.
I don't think British people should be allowed to write about India and I don't think British classicists should be allowed to write about Greece. Burn the whole thing down and start over.
(Two stars instead of one because Stoneman can't help being born in England and I don't think he was trying to make this book as impenetrable as possible to discourage readers and consequently criticism, which is at least something.)
Still, our main source of information of the Greek view of anything—certainly by the Hellenistic period—is their copious literary output, so you might expect that a book like this would be sufficiently up a philologist's street that even an Englishman could pull it off. As it turns out: not so. Though Stoneman provides enough keywords for an interested reader to know where to begin their own research (mainly the names of Ctesias and Megasthenes), he only ever engages with any texts themselves in the most roundabout way, citing other people's opinions with wild disregard for the credibility of those opinions and creating a chronological and thematic muddle that takes up a lot of paper but contains stunningly little substance. When he does try to provide historical context for those Greek authors, it's immediately apparent he's fundamentally incapable of interpreting the work of actual historians and archaeologists, being unable even to begin to distinguish mainstream or plausible claims from outright fringe or at least very speculative ones (possibly the low point of this is when he casually claims Berossus wrote about Noah, which was a fashionable confusion in the 1600s), and though it would be going too far to accuse Stoneman of nostalgia for the British Empire, it's certainly true that being steeped in that environment for so long leads him to project an anachronistic racism onto both the Greeks and the Indians.
Most impressive to me, though, is the etymological trivia he peppers throughout the book, possibly in an attempt to demonstrate that philologists don't have to play second fiddle to linguists: as far as I can tell, every single etymology given is wrong in some meaningful way. If I hadn't already interacted with people like Stoneman before, I'd think the entire thing an elaborate prank.
I don't think British people should be allowed to write about India and I don't think British classicists should be allowed to write about Greece. Burn the whole thing down and start over.
(Two stars instead of one because Stoneman can't help being born in England and I don't think he was trying to make this book as impenetrable as possible to discourage readers and consequently criticism, which is at least something.)
September 20, 2020
This fascinating account of the interaction between Ancient India and Ancient Greece deserves to be more widely read. The first half to two-thirds of the book serves as a detailed description of significant portions of ancient Indian history, in order to elucidate what the Greeks encountered when they arrived on the subcontinent.
Next, the reader is treated to a fabulous discussion of Indian philosophy, and the influence it may have had on the Greek philosophers. While rejecting any Indian influence on Pythagoras, Stoneman ultimately concludes that the Sceptic philosopher Pyrrho, who was an influence on the hedonist Epicurus, may well have derived his epistemology—consisting of scepticism, materialism and the rejection of dogmatism—from the Indian philosophers he encountered at the University of ancient Taxila, as well as the ethical concept of ataraxia (unperturbedness), key to Pyrrhoism and Epicureanism.
Finally, the history of the Indo-Greek kingdoms—usually relegated to a footnote in most standard histories of India—is detailed. Beginning with the Treaty of the Indus, signed after Chandragupta Maurya defeated Alexander’s successor in northwest India, it runs through to the most significant Indo-Greek king Menander, who is central to the philosophical work The Questions of King Milinder. The section is rounded off with an overview of the development of Indo-Greek art at Gandhara and elsewhere.
Next, the reader is treated to a fabulous discussion of Indian philosophy, and the influence it may have had on the Greek philosophers. While rejecting any Indian influence on Pythagoras, Stoneman ultimately concludes that the Sceptic philosopher Pyrrho, who was an influence on the hedonist Epicurus, may well have derived his epistemology—consisting of scepticism, materialism and the rejection of dogmatism—from the Indian philosophers he encountered at the University of ancient Taxila, as well as the ethical concept of ataraxia (unperturbedness), key to Pyrrhoism and Epicureanism.
Finally, the history of the Indo-Greek kingdoms—usually relegated to a footnote in most standard histories of India—is detailed. Beginning with the Treaty of the Indus, signed after Chandragupta Maurya defeated Alexander’s successor in northwest India, it runs through to the most significant Indo-Greek king Menander, who is central to the philosophical work The Questions of King Milinder. The section is rounded off with an overview of the development of Indo-Greek art at Gandhara and elsewhere.
August 16, 2024
A fascinating history of how India and Greece influenced each other in culture, art and philosophy since the invasion of Alexander into northern India.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews