Global InformationAlexandria in Orietai information
Alexandria in Orietai | |
|---|---|
City | |
 Cities of Alexander in Pakistan | |
| Coordinates: 27°30′N 67°30′E / 27.500°N 67.500°E | |
| Country | Pakistan |
| Founded by | Alexander the Great |
Alexandria in Orietai was one of the seventy-plus cities founded or renamed by Alexander the Great.[1]
The town was founded by Alexander in autumn of 325 BC after his army had separated from Nearchus and the boats near the mouth of the Indus River. The sources agree that a town was built among the Oritae, that the fortification was left to Hephaestion[2] and Leonnatus be built in the autumn of 325 BC and that it was located near Rhambacia, the largest town of the Oreitai.[3][4][5] The core of colonists were retired Arachosian horsemen.
Alexander probably intended the new town to be an emporium controlling the local and Indian spice trade through the passes to Kandahar. The area certainly had exotic resources for trade. Written four centuries later the Roman Periplus of the Erythraean Sea says that this area "yields much wheat, wine, rice and dates but along the coast there is nothing but Bdellium".[6]
- ^ Edward James Rapson, The Cambridge History of India, Volume 1. 1955 Cambridge University Press. Page 380
- ^ The Campaigns of Alexander By Arrian(google ebook) Penguin UK 2003 page 331
- ^ Diodorus 17.104.4-8
- ^ Quintus Curtius 9.10.5-7
- ^ Arrian Anabais 6.21.3-6
- ^ Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, Chapter 38