The Heliodorus Pillar

After Alexander the Great's invasion into India in 326 B.C. and his subsequent death, his Empire was divided, and the Eastern part was given to his General Seleucus Nicator. Many Greeks settled in North West India thereafter.

 There is a stone column called the Heliodorus pillar in Vidisha, modern Besnagar, about 5 miles from the Buddhist Sanchi stupa in Madhya Pradesh ( about 40 miles from Bhopal ) built in 113 B.C. by Heliodorus,the Greek Ambassador of the Indo- Greek king Antialcidas to the Sunga king Bhagabhadra. The inscription on this pillar reads :

 " This Garuda column of Vasudev ( Vishnu ), the God of gods was erected by Heliodorus, a worshipper of Vishnu, and the son of Dion, an inhabitant of Taxila, who came as Greek Ambassador from the great King Antialcidas to King Kashiputra Bhagabhadra, then reigning in the fourteenth year of his kingship.

 Three immortal precepts, when practised well, will lead to heaven---self-restraint, charity, and conscientiousness "

 This pillar and its inscriptions, are remarkable, and show the tremendous power of assimilation and absorption India had. As I said in my article ' What is India ' ( see online and on my blog justicekatju.blogspot.in and on the website kgfindia.com ), India is broadly a country of immigrants, like North America. All who came here were absorbed and assimilitated here. The Greeks, too, who came here were Indianized, as the Heliodorus pillar shows.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heliodorus_pillar