Seleucid–Mauryan treaty links the Greek and Indian worlds
- Date
- c. 305–303 BCE
- Category
- Politics & governance
- Region
- Indus Valley and Eastern Iran
- Era
- Classical Antiquity
- Significance
When Seleucus I Nicator crossed the Indus to recover the easternmost provinces once held by Alexander, he confronted Chandragupta Maurya, founder of India's first great empire.
The conflict ended around 303 BCE not in conquest but in a treaty: Seleucus ceded the eastern satrapies of Arachosia, Paropamisadae and Gedrosia (parts of modern Afghanistan and Pakistan) to the Mauryas, sealed by a marriage alliance, and received 500 Indian war elephants in return. Those elephants proved decisive for Seleucus at the Battle of Ipsus in 301 BCE. The settlement fixed a stable frontier and opened sustained diplomatic and cultural contact between the Hellenistic and Indian worlds, exemplified by the Greek ambassador Megasthenes at the Mauryan court and, later, the bilingual Greek-and-Aramaic edicts of Chandragupta's grandson Ashoka — a striking instance of Hellenistic Greece's reach into South Asia.
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Empires active in c. 305–303 BCE
- Roman Republic509 BCE – 27 BCE
- Maurya Empire322 BCE – 185 BCE
- Kingdom of Kush1070 BCE – 350 CE
- Odrysian Kingdom480 BCE – 46 CE
- Carthaginian Empire650 BCE – 146 BCE
- Seleucid Empire312 BCE – 63 BCE
Related politics & governance events
- Chandragupta Maurya founds the Maurya Empirec. 321 BCE
- Death of Alexander and the Partition of Babylon323 BCE
- Qin unification of China and the First Emperor221 BCE
- Royal Cemetery Shifts to Meroe, Launching the Meroitic Period of Kushc. 300 BCE
- Arsaces founds the Parthian (Arsacid) Empirec. 247 BCE
- Cleisthenes' reforms establish Athenian democracy508/507 BCE
Further reading
The wider story
Dividing the Spoils: The War for Alexander the Great's Empire
Gripping account of the Successors who carved up Alexander's world.
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