Gedrosia

People

According to Arrian, Nearchus mentions a race called Ichthyophagi ("fish-eaters") as inhabiting the barren shores of the Gwadar and Pasni districts in Makrān. During the homeward march of Alexander the Great, his admiral, Nearchus, led a fleet in the Arabian Sea along the Makrān coast and recorded that the area was dry and mountainous, inhabited by the Ichthyophagoi or Fish-Eaters. They are also identified on the 4th century Peutinger Map, as a people of the Baluchistan coast. The existence of such tribes was confirmed by Sir Richard F Burton.

Another group of people named as Oreitans were mentioned inhabiting modern Lasbela District in the Balochistan province of Pakistan. Alexander the Great crossed Hub River through Lasbela on his way back to Babylon after his campaigns in northwestern India. Alexander mentions the river name as Arabius, and local people as Oreitans.

History

Achaemenid satrapy

Gedrosia was a dry, mountainous country along the northwestern shores of the Indian Ocean. It was occupied in the Bronze Age by people who settled in the few oases in the region. Other people settled on the coast and became known in Greek as Ichthyophagi. It was conquered by Cyrus the Great or Darius the Great in the Gedrosian campaign, although information about the conquest is comparatively late. The capital of Gedrosia was Pura, which is probably identical to modern Bampur, forty kilometers west of Irânshahr.

Several scholars have argued that the Persian satrapy Maka is identical to Gedrosia (which is a Greek name). One argument is the similarity of the name Maka to the modern name Makran, a part of Pakistan and Iran that is situated a bit more to the east. However, it is more likely that Maka is to be sought in modern Oman, which was called Maketa in Antiquity.

Alexander's campaign

Gedrosia became famous in the West when the Greek king Alexander the Great tried to cross the Gedrosian desert and lost one third of his men.

Following his army's refusal to continue marching east at the Hyphasis River in 326 BC, Alexander the Great crossed the area after sailing south to the coast of the Indian Ocean on his way back to Babylon. Upon reaching the Ocean, Alexander divided his forces in half, sending half back by sea to Susa under the command of Nearchus. The other half of his army was to accompany him on a march through the Gedrosian desert, inland from the ocean. Throughout the 60-day march through the desert, Alexander lost at least 12,000 soldiers, in addition to countless livestock, camp followers, and most of his baggage train. Some historians say he lost three-quarters of his army to the harsh desert conditions along the way. However, this figure was possibly based on exaggerated numbers in his forces prior to the march, which were in the range of no fewer than 30,000 soldiers.

There are two competing theories for the purpose of Alexander's decision to march through the desert rather than along the more hospitable coast. The first argues that this was an attempt to punish his men for their refusal to continue eastward at the Hyphasis River. The other argues that Alexander was attempting to imitate and succeed in the actions of Cyrus the Great, who had failed to cross the desert. It is plausible that Alexander had an ambition to safely cross through the desert with his army, unlike Semiramis' and Cyrus' failed Gedrosian campaigns; both left to flee away from the region with their remaining few men.

After the death of Alexander, this region became part of the holdings of Seleucus, who held Aria, Arachosia, and Gandhara, in addition to Gedrosia.

Mauryan conquest

The territories were later ceded by Seleucus to the ancient Indian Mauryan Empire during the reign of Chandragupta Maurya. Gedrosia, along with Saurashtra, formed an important part of the Maurya Empire, before being attacked by Indo-Greeks from the west.