Epigraphic Remains of Indian Traders in Egypt

Abstract

A handful of little known fragments of inscriptions in Indian languages and scripts found in Egypt provide epigraphical corroboration for the copious testimony of classical sources about the flourishing trade between India and the Roman Empire. These include three records from the Red Sea port of Quseir, one in Prakrit and two in Old Tamil, whose linguistic and paleographic features point toward South India as the place of origin of the Indian merchants in Egypt. This accords with the evidence from a fragmentary Greek farce from Oxyrhyncus containing garbled imitations of an Indian language which, according to some scholars, may be an archaic form of Kannada or some other Dravidian language. Also, a Greek inscription from RedEs-ye invoking the blessings of Pan apparently bears the name of a Hellenized Indian 16(pov, perhaps = Subhanu. Thus the epigraphic material attests to the presence of both temporary sojourners and long-term assimilated residents among Indians in Egypt during the early centuries of the Christian era.