Page:History of India Vol 2.djvu/245

 THE PARTHIAN KING GONDOPHARES 20? Azes (Azas) I, Azilises, Azes n, and Gondophares. The princes prior to the last named are known from their coins only. Gondophares, whose accession may be dated with practical certainty in 21 A. D., and whose coins are Parthian in style, enjoyed a long reign of some thirty years, and is a more interesting personage. He reigned, like his predecessors, in the Kabul valley and the Panjab. The special interest attaching to Gondophares is due to the fact that his name is associated with that of St. Thomas, the apostle of the Parthians, in very ancient Christian tradition. The belief that the Par- thians were allotted as the special sphere of the mis- sionary labours of St. Thomas goes back to the time of Origen, who died in the middle of the third century, and is also mentioned in the Clementine Recognitions, a work of the same period, and possibly somewhat ear- lier in date. The nearly contemporary Acts of St. Thomas, as well as later tradition, generally associate the Indians, rather than the Parthians, with the name of the apostle, but the terms " India " and " Indians " had such vague signification in ancient times that the discrepancy is not great. The earliest form of the tradition clearly deserves the greater credit, and there is no apparent reason for discrediting the statement handed down by Origen that Thomas received Parthia as his allotted region. According to the Clementine Recognitions, the apostolic preaching brought about very desirable re- forms in the morals and manners of the Medes and