Bactria, or Bactriana, was an ancient Iranian civilization in Central Asia based in the area south of the Oxus River and north of the mountains of the Hindu Kush, an area within the north of modern Afghanistan. Bactria was strategically located south of Sogdia and the western part of the Pamir Mountains. The extensive mountain ranges acted as protective "walls" on three sides, with the Pamir on the north and the Hindu Kush on south forming a junction with the Karakoram range towards the east.
Xerxes I tomb, Bactrian soldier c. 470 BC.
Pre-Seleucid Athenian owl imitation from Bactria, possibly from the time of Sophytes.
Gold stater of the Greco-Bactrian king Eucratides
The treasure of the royal burial Tillia tepe is attributed to 1st century BC Sakas in Bactria.
Bactrian is an extinct Eastern Iranian language formerly spoken in the Central Asian region of Bactria and used as the official language of the Kushan and the Hephthalite empires.
Bactrian language
The Rabatak inscription is an inscription written on a rock in the Bactrian language and the Greek script, which was found in 1993 at the site of Rabatak, near Surkh Kotal in Afghanistan. The inscription relates to the rule of the Kushan emperor Kanishka, and gives remarkable clues on the genealogy of the Kushan dynasty.
The Surkh Kotal inscription (SK4) is the first known substantial document written in Bactrian, an Iranian language. It uses the Greek script. It was written at the time of the Kushan ruler Huvishka, 2nd century CE. Kabul Museum.
The Hephthalites used the Bactrian script (top). Here, their endonym Ebodalo (ηβοδαλο), "Hephthalites".
