Eucratides, 171-145 BC, AE Square Unit

Eucratides I, square unit, AR, reign 171–145 BC, Paropamisadai or Gandhara mint, 7.76g, 19mm. Obverse with diademed and helmeted bust of Eucratides to right, BAΣIΛEΩΣ MEΓAΛOY EYKPATIΔOY around. Reverse with the Dioscuri charging on horseback with couched spears, Kharoshthi legend maharajasa evukratidasa around; control monogram off the flan. Struck on a compact square flan with some peripheral loss to the devices and legends from the flan shape; surfaces and details preserved with typical localized weakness at the edges. Cf. Bopearachchi, Monnaies Gréco-Bactriennes et Indo-Grecques (Eucratides bilingual issues); cf. Mitchiner, Indo-Greek and Indo-Scythian Coinage (Eucratides bilingual series).

Eucratides I styled himself “Great King” and was a principal ruler of the Greco-Bactrian kingdom during its period of military expansion and political fragmentation. His bilingual issues, combining Greek and Kharoshthi legends and employing local weight and fabric conventions, document the extension of Hellenistic royal authority into the regions of Paropamisadai and Gandhara and the monetary accommodation between Greek and South Asian administrative and commercial spheres.