Last episode, we discussed Pliny the Elder, who wrote the world’s first encyclopedia and lived to see 9 Roman emperors, which sounds worse than it is as Rome is trucking along just fine when Pliny meets his demise in Pompeii. Rome is trading with China in the East, and both empires are flourishing in the late 1st century. Right in the middle of these two powerhouses is a small empire where the Silk Road passes straight through: The Kushans, whose open borders allow said Silk Road to flourish. This burgeoning power occupies territory around where Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan’s modern borders meet.

It’s in these lands that a man named Kanishka is born in roughly 79 AD, at least several months before Mt. Vesuvius claims the life of Pliny the Elder. I say roughly because time frames are sketchy when it comes to the Kushan. Every historical record about them that’s survived is either a second hand account or inferred via archaeological findings. So, take all of these dates with a grain of salt or 2 or 5000, and we’ll stick to Kanishka’s life and how his exploits led to historians bequeathing on him their favorite title: the Great.

Like this season’s two main characters thus far, Kanishka the not-yet-but-soon-to-be Great starts out in a prominent position in society. It’s just a lot easier to make history when you’ve got a leg up on the competition. Funny enough though...or perhaps sadly, class mobility in the world as a whole at this time is actually about as good as it’ll be until we reach relatively modern times. Commoners in Rome, Han China, and the Kushan all had the possibility of “making it”. Way better than say, during the centuries of serfdom that peasants would later endure while living in medieval Europe.

Unlike Pliny and Wang Mang, Kanishka is born into a nascent empire just a few decades old. Before his birth, his great-grandfather had unified a semi-nomadic band of tribes that had originally descended from the areas of Ukraine or Siberia. These tribes were herdsmen, following nature’s food trail as they slowly migrated southeast over the centuries until semi-settling down in the lands northwest of China about 200 years before Kanishka’s birth. The Xiongnu, that ever-present thorn in the side of Han China to their north, expands west when they can’t expand south because of that thriving Chinese Empire. They aggressively drive out Kanishka’s ancestors, and his people hit the road again. 

They eventually find a new grazing land for their sheep, goats, and other pastoral animals, and settle more permanently in the region between the northwest Hindu Kush mountains and the Amu Darya river that runs along the Western border of Uzbekistan. This area equates to modern-day Northern Afghanistan. While you might understandably conjure up images of deserts and mountains, this was some of the most arable land in the region 2,000 years ago. Gradual climate changes and the past few centuries of human activity have not been kind to the environment.

Back in the region’s fertile days, it was known as Bactria, a holy land of sorts for the ancient Zoroastrian faith that originated in Persia at least 700 years before Kanishka’s birth, and maybe as many as 1,500 years prior.

For those who haven’t heard of Zoroastrianism, I’m certainly not going to cover an entire religion here but you should at least know: it’s the world’s oldest surviving monotheistic faith, with as many as 100,000 followers today. Not a lot, but hey, longevity counts for something.

So, Bactria, where Kanishka’s ancestors settled. The Achaemenid Empire, the one the Greeks fought in the semi-historical movie The 300, used to send captured Greeks to these lands. Not long after, Alexander the Great stretched the eastern border of his empire here, bringing more Greek culture to the area. By the time the pre-Kushan tribes claim these lands as their home, Greek influence has been shaping civilization here for 300 years. None of that is super important yet, but when Kanishka establishes the Kushan Empire as a silk road hub, you better believe these multicultural elements allow the young empire flourish. They also influence Kanishka as a person and a ruler.

Fast forward to Kanishka’s great granddad. Around the middle of the 1st century, he orchestrates the formation of a confederation from these semi-nomadic pastoralist tribes. Via diplomacy and strong arming, he unites all of these people under his rule, promising a lot and delivering on said promises. The confederation’s combined might ousts all of the small foreign kingdoms in or around Bactria, claiming the land they’ve merely been living on as their sovereign domain.

His two successors, the grandfather and father of Kanishka, start acting less like they oversee a confederation and more like they run an empire. They send ambassadors to the Eastern Han and establish themselves as a Central Asian trading hub, growing extremely rich according to one Chinese historian at the time. They expand out from there, basically conquering low-hanging fruit and building an empire on the ruins of Alexander the Great’s regional successors. Imagine these ancient cities in a state of disrepair but with good bones ready for a people to rejuvenate them.

The Kushans are those people. Shortly before Kanishka is born, they add to their existing copper and silver currency, coins made of gold, acquired through trade with Rome. Both Hindu and Buddhist symbols are printed on these, and we see the first physical proof of Kushan’s multicultural elements. These are people who, over the course of 20 generations, moved from north of the Black Sea to China to Central Asia, intermarrying with various locals along the way, and it seems fitting that it’s them who come to straddle both Persia and India. This background means tolerance will play a key role in their continued expansion.

With ambassadors stretching to the Western and Eastern ends of the known world, the Kushan are making a name for themselves. They set their experienced army on protecting the Silk Road, allowing the exchange of silk, spices, wines, gold, art and slaves. Also ideas. Ideas are big. So is foreshadowing.

This burgeoning empire is where Kanishka born. He’ll be the forth son in a row to lead the empire, and like these rulers’ multicultural backgrounds, this fortunate stability in succession lays the foundation for their upcoming rapid ascent. 

Kanishka was born in or close to modern day Afghanistan, near the northeastern Pakistan border. A dozen scholars have pointed to a dozen locations, and I doubt we’ll ever know the answer due to one simple fact: The Kushans maintained their semi-nomadic state even after rising to a world power. The ruling class moved capitals with the season, maintaining separate bases of power during spring, summer, and winter. Modern day Peshawar in Pakistan housed them most often, but unlike presumptive heirs in Rome and China, Kanishka didn’t grow up in a palace. He grew up just, like, the, rest of us. Nah, kidding. He didn’t grow up in a palace. He grew up in several.

Despite his grandiose upbringing, this mobile residency leads to his witnessing the everyday comings and goings of much of his future domain. This affords him a better idea of how his subjects operated compared to most rulers. His mom was probably a princess from the Parthian empire to the west, either a product of a political marriage or a component in a peace agreement. Parthia, at the time of Kanishka’s birth, had made some political gains against Rome by claiming the right to decree the king of Armenia, which was a buffer state of sorts between the two empires. This gain was recent though, and the Parthian Empire still felt uncertainty over their future with Rome. Additionally, Kushan’s rise meant the ousting of troublesome nomadic tribes on Parthia’s Eastern border, which Parthia happily encouraged. Finally, Parthia decided it’d be nice if they held some claim to the throne in the Kushan lands...you know, just in case.

While Kanishka’s mother doesn’t play a major role in his upbringing, at least to our knowledge, she does add to his worldly education. Parthia owes a significant portion of its power base to trade, primarily from the Silk Road that Kushan has started also reaping the rewards of. Now, I should make clear that the Silk Road was never a single route like hopping on an interstate freeway. However, the majority of its numerous east-west routes passed through the small space between the Caspian Sea and the Persian Gulf, which Parthia controlled. There’s still plenty of land east of that, so it seems plausible that early in Kanishka’s life, he might’ve wondered how much wealthier his people would be if the Kushan controlled all the areas that feed into that confined land mass.

Kanishka’s education is mostly done as an only child. A potential brother doesn’t enter the scene until much later in his life—late enough he might have been his son. That said, half-siblings probably exist on his dad’s side. Given the practice of polygamy among the ruling classes of the kingdoms and empires east, west, and south of the Kushans, and their propensity to chameleon local and regional customs, it’s very likely this practice is employed by Kushan rulers. Regardless, if these paternal siblings did exist, they will fail to play noteworthy roles.

This family situation, coupled with a mobile upbringing, instills a strong independent spirit in the boy. So too does the degree of freedom he experiences in his education. Multiple cultures mean a multitude of values, and he grew up speaking as many as three languages. In the same vein, Kushan children would study and admire a variety of art from Greek, Persian, Indian, and Central Asian cultures. Thus, independence and an open mind form a strong guiding light for Kanishka, but art...isn’t his passion. Nor is education, well, in the scholarly sense. Kanishka instead gravitated to a different sort of Kushan education: the military. The Kushan elite and many others all learned the valuable skills of horse riding, archery, and various fighting methods from an early age. And early on, Kanishka excels in his training.

Proof of this is found in his impact on society as a young adult. Though he doesn’t technically begin his rule until 127 AD, at age 48, he’s not without power or influence in the realm. Heir-apparents in Kushan often took on a more active role compared to other monarchies, acting akin to a junior monarch. The empire itself rules as a decentralized state, allowing certain pre-existing rulers to continue on as kings, predominately those in Western India. This frees up resources to allow for yet more conquest.

This is a delight to Kanishka’s ear, and he rubs his hands together in excitement as he transitions from a boy to a man. As a late teenager, he leaves his comfortable-yet-boring palace life behind and takes a command over several soldiers. Successes in multiple small engagements increases his respect in the army and from dear old dad. The size of his contingent grows quickly from there, and his military acumen leads to greater and greater victories. Soon, he’s leading full armies, conquering one territory after the next. He doesn’t stick around to bask in the glory of victory though.

Kanishka was raised as a nomad, traveling with the seasons, so he can’t stay in one place long without getting the itch to see new lands. Unfortunately for all of his neighbors, the lands he’s interested in are theirs. It turns out the sweet taste of military success has created a hunger he will forever find difficult to sate.

A couple niche Ancient Buddhist texts paint Kanishka as hotheaded. Though these texts have their own motives, i.e. demonstrating the calming power of Buddhism a few decades later, it’s an attribute I’m happy to buy into. Kanishka pretty much always gets what he wants and young adults used to getting what they want can often flare with tempers when they don’t. And there’s obviously a heavy aggressive element to Kanishka as well.

But however fiery he may be, he is not rash.

After each conquest, he takes time to examine the region’s existing power structures and places familiar faces at the top, a practice put into place by his forefathers. By the time Kanishka reaches his mid 20s, the Kushans employ a mix of administrative systems derived from Greco-Indians, Chinese, Iranians, and North-Central Indians. What this translates to is: what the young empire lacks in cultural identity, they make up for in unity, letting people live the lives to which they’ve grown accustomed. This freeform approach gives rise to a powerful middle class of craftsman and merchants. And by the end of the 1st century, the Kushan Empire stretches from the Aral Sea to the Arabian Sea.

More importantly, for them and their merchants, they now completely control the routes between China and Parthia, as well as between India and Parthia, which is a notable aspect of the silk road that’s rarely mentioned. There’s a reason the East India Company will war over India over a millennium from now, but it’s through good ole fashioned trade that the ancient world reaped these resources.

This isn’t so much a strict control of imports and exports like we think about with trade today. Instead, it’s about access to play the game. For example, the silk road grants local smiths access to any metal they want to work with, which means the export of finished goods outside and within the empire, with a level of demand that only rises as the involved societies continue to prosper, whether that means crafting weapons of war or luxury items for an ever richer upper class.

By his late 20s or early 30s though, Kanishka cools off a bit on the warmongering, likely due to his aging father and a necessity to learn the nuance of more direct rule. He takes on the title King of Kashmir, directly overseeing areas of today’s Northern India and Eastern Pakistan. It’s a fitting location for a ruler that likes to be up and about and doing things. Kashmir has served as the summer capital for a few decades now, and it’s an idyllic retreat. The region’s lush green valleys, snow-capped mountains, and beautiful lakes have earned it the title of “Paradise of Earth”. This is a modern title of course, but pre-industralization, I doubt the grand vistas were any less breathtaking.

Before continuing, I want to reiterate that we don’t have a ton of first-hand evidence about the Kushans or Kanishka. All of his age milestones are educated guesses based on third party inscriptions and historical map projections. More than the previous two episodes, this man’s life requires a lot of piecing together clues to form any sort of narrative structure. 

...And now that we’ve hopped aboard the speculation wagon, we’re going full steam ahead. The big reason is that any other approach results in a dozen contradictions. I’ll point one of the big ones out in a bit.

As King of Kashmir, Kanishka takes his job seriously and brings a pseudo-military approach to his rule. He enforces the laws fairly and equally, with little wiggle room. But the young empire is still going through changes, and most local laws are more like customs, without any hard and fast regulation. These, Kanishka presumably lets slide. He’s an outsider to these people and ultimately is here for two reasons: to collect taxes to pay for an army, or to lead an army that the taxes paid for. The people are fine paying their fair share and taking advantage of the stability that the Kushan empire brings.

As his 15-year rule over a single, albeit large, kingdom continues, the worldly views he had developed as a child narrows. With the Kushans taking so much Indian territory, and Kanishka directly ruling these people, he starts to see Greek influence as archaic. Unlike so many kings in history, he seeks to adapt to his subjects, rather than adapt his subjects to him. Probably so he can tax and draft them without anyone throwing a fit. But hey, noble deeds have been done for less.

His opportunity to leave his mark on the Kushan internal structure hits in 127 AD, when his dad dies. Like his predecessor, Kanishka takes his son—one of perhaps many—under his wing as a junior co-ruler. Kanishka’s the man in charge, but as we’ve seen before, heir-apparents held significant power in the empire. What this heir actually does though is... unclear. Any accomplishments are overshadowed by the giant that is Kanishka. We can assume though that the heir acted as his right arm, probably more in civil matters than military given that the successor to Kanishka’s reign will bring a marked period of peace. In the present, the 48-year-old Kanishka makes big changes after securing his succession line.

He initiates administrative and currency reform that removes Greek prominence from the government. The legal spoken language changes to Bactrian, an East Iranian language originating from that Afghanistan/Uzbekistan area where his ancestors first settled. Coins that once scrawled Greek letters along the bottom are scrapped for iconography belonging to the three faiths of the empire: Zoroastrianism, Hinduism and Buddhism, though the third of these probably comes a few years later.

These coins also always feature the ruler, and in Kanishka’s case, he styles himself as a Persian, somewhat owing to his maternal lineage, but mainly because that’s the empire primary demographic. With trade such an important part of the empire, minting these coins meant that every day people would see their ruler was like them. Or, for smaller yet still massive groups like Indians, like their neighbors. It also helps to establish a fresh identity before he dispatches ambassadors to China, Parthia, and Rome. As warmongering as Kanishka is, he’s not foolish enough to bite OFF more than he can chew. Better to secure those borders and deepen trade relations.

On his ascent to the throne, he also takes a note out of the Han empire’s playbook, claiming divine heritage with titles like Son of Heaven. As if to prove this to his subjects, he erects a temple to a pantheon of gods from the Zoroastrian and Hindu faiths...and in his uhh...humility, includes himself and his forefathers. All of this leads to an empire that pays respect to the gods with coins, architecture, and language, and with Kanishka standing right next to those deities in all aspects, adds further legitimacy to his reign.

It’s a shrewd political move to be sure, but it also points to an egotistical mindset. It takes a certain level of hubris to line oneself up next to the gods. He’d spent most of his time as heir winning battles, and it’s rare for such dominance not to get inside a person’s head. Especially someone of noble birth. That may also be why we don’t know much about the heir’s activities during Kanishka’s reign. Sharing glory like that was for lesser men.

He sort of formalizes the city of Peshawar in Pakistan as the empire’s primary capital. Although rulers had spent most of their winters in Peshawar before, now the city operates as the empire’s center. Somewhat because, geographically, it was the center of the empire. Somewhat because as the world’s 7th most populous city at the time, it already served as a trade center for citizens and merchants of the silk road. However much Kanishka loved Kashmir, Peshawar just made more sense as a base of operations.

We can see Kanishka then as a progressive ruler, open to change that best aligns him with his subjects. There are no signs of intolerance toward minorities or smaller religious sects as happens with so many of history’s populist leaders. That’s not to say this is an egalitarian utopia. It probably helps that as a male in a patriarchal society, he probably identified more with his paternal heritage, meaning he was the minority.

I’ll let you chew on all of that as I take my halfway-point break.

Alright, now lets get ready to rumble!

Early into his reign as head of state, king of kings, and a walking god, Kanishka shifts his role from conqueror to defender, which needs some backstory. A couple decades back, Rome had bullied Parthia around 115 AD. After the Perisan empire accepted a 1-sided peace deal in Rome’s favor, and had recovered from their losses, they looked eastward, engaging in a series of border skirmishes with the Kushans. Nothing major happens, but in the 15 years since Rome humiliated Parthia, the great Eastern empire had rebuilt, retooled, and viewed Kushan’s transition of ruler as an opportunity for war.

So much for those ambassadors.

The Kushan king of kings rides out from Peshewar and leads his nation as a general once again, a role he eternally relishes. While the relatively new Kushan empire lacks the tradition and professionalism of the world’s current powers, they boast a degree of combined arms that allow for competent strategists like Kanishka to overcome their foes. We’re talking about an army influenced by Greek hoplites with their spear and shield, Pre-Mongol mobile archers, armored Persian cavalry, and even included Indian war elephants. They’d fought for decades on mountains, steppes, and flat plains, adapting to all terrains, much how Kanishka adapts his policies to his people.

A few inconsequential years pass in this Kushan-Parthian war before culminating in the two sides meeting for a decisive clash. It rages for days, neither side wishing to admit to defeat, soldiers charging, reforming, and charging once again in pitched battle after pitched battle. In the aftermath, one source says 900,000 Parthians lay dead.

That...did not happen. Battles in this region scream “Whose Line is it Anyway” where the numbers are made up and don’t matter. What does matter is that even though Kushan wins, Kanishka lingers over the bloody carnage and feels a strange pit in his stomach. Is this truly all there is to ruling?

Over the next several months and years, he’ll start to seek a greater meaning to his life, to his rule, to something beyond conquering lands. Don’t get me wrong, this hardly turns him into a pacifist, and he uses his victory over the Parthians as an excuse to push the borders a little further west. But still, witnessing the bloody aftermath on such an unrivaled scale sets him on a path that will lead to his “Great” epithet—his support of Mahayana Buddhism.

While searching for this meaning, with his army freed up from battling Parthia, he falls into old habits and earmarks the kingdoms of Northern India for territorial expansion. He spends the next several years expanding Kushan’s domain and while sieging one of these kingdom’s capitals, he hears word that a renowned Buddhist monk by the name of Ashvaghosha is there extolling wisdom to the masses. Supposedly, Kanishka demands 300,000 gold pieces as tribute to drop the siege, though he’s willing to drop it to a cool 100k if the besieged king adds the Buddha’s alms bowl, a key relic of the religion, and Ashvaghosha to the deal. After a brief hesitation, the besieged king agrees, and the Buddhist monk immediately rises to an advisory rule in the Kushan empire.

In yet another tale that certainly didn’t happen but is super fun, Kanishka’s advisors express disappointment that while 100,000 gold coins for the alms bowl tracked, giving up another 100,000 for one man made no sense.

To demonstrate the worth of Ashvaghosha, Kanishka starves 7 horses for 6 days—yikes—then invites his advisors—and the horses—to listen to Ashvaghosha preach the Buddhist Dharma, which is sort of the tenets, virtues, and duties of the religion.

Imagine perhaps 15 men (and 7 cruelly starved horses) gathered in the grand courtyard of the imperial palace. Brick and stone of the palace walls surround the crowd, with rows of columns on both sides. At their feet lay relatively austere stone floors. But on the walls are murals and art reliefs, illustrating the Kushan empire’s great accomplishments in its short history. Where Greek statues once stood at corners of the courtyard now stand images of Hindu gods, or perhaps Kanishka and his ancestors. And there would of course be some Buddhist symbols painted or carved there as well. But no actual depiction of the Buddha himself, not yet.

With the stage set for Ashvaghosha, he begins his oration. Servants finally deliver the famished horses some food, but like everyone else in attendance, the animals so caught up with the Buddhist monk’s revelations they don’t eat until after he finishes. The advisors all apologize to Kanishka for doubting the man’s worth, and praise his wisdom in bringing the monk into his inner circle.

The truth of this story is irrelevant compared to its meaning—Ashvaghosha is revered both by the Kushans and Buddhists as a generational talent. As Kanishka finishes solidifying his grasp on India between the Ganges River and Himalayas, a task that last until the 10th year of his reign, he develops a close friendship with the Buddhist monk. This accelerates the religious and cultural changes already occurring in the empire. Buddhism is on the rise in India, and as usual, Kanishka happily follows the changing currents. A new position in the Kushan government is created explicitly for Ashvaghosha, whose chief responsibilities will be the planning and construction of Buddhist temples across the nation.

After a decade of almost constant war, Kanishka has found his second calling. That said, he never converts to Buddhism. In fact, many of the temples that go up during his reign, and are attributed to him, are actually funded by rich elites paying for their construction. The most prominent of these structures is the stupa, a dome shaped monument that houses sacred Buddhist relics and was meant for meditation and devotion. Paths often surround these structures, so devotees might walk in contemplation. The largest of these, the Kanishka Stupa, is estimated to have stood somewhere between 400 and 550 feet tall.

While Kanishka’s sometimes portrayal as a builder of the faith is overblown, he still deserves credit for fostering an environment of religious freedom where Buddhists, Hindus, and Zoroastrians can all practice indiscriminately.

Why Buddhism flourishes at this time, particularly the nascent Mahayana branch, can largely be chalked up to a synergy between Kanishka’s rule and Mahayana’s tenets. A perfect storm.

A key evolution in the religion is the image of Buddha himself. As I alluded to earlier, up until now, Buddhism relied on symbology to depict the man. Two art schools, probably founded during Kanishka’s reign or late in his father’s, changed that tradition. In the Gandhara art school, near the Peshawar capital, artists sculpt the first human depiction of Buddha. They draw inspiration from Hellenistic art styles that are rather ubiquitous given the aforementioned Greek influence throughout empire. However much Kanishka stripped Greek influence from the government, the respect for their culture was alive and well. These artists portray Buddha not as that happy, fat man many of us are familiar with today, but with a lean, naturalistic style, and this image starts to spread.

Then, in the secondary capital of Mathura, a 3-hour car ride from Delhi today, this leads to paintings and murals that are influenced by their colleague’s depiction of Buddha.

The more relatable image to associate with the religion piques people’s curiosities, inviting them to listen to practitioners of Buddhism. Mahayana, specifically, differs from the other branches of Buddhism with its focus on communal nirvana, compassion, and a path to enlightenment for the lay person, rather than just monks.

So, commoners find a religion for the masses, and it’s no surprise that these supporters happily spread the word via trade to and from distant empires. They want to talk about this great new religion that will make a better world for everyone. This focus on lifting up the downtrodden is not too dissimilar to how Christianity is gaining popularity over in the Roman Empire, especially in Syria and Anatolia.

Support among the Kushan masses leads to the proliferation of Buddhist art and temples around the empire. From here, it will soon gain a foothold in Han China.

Witnessing what Kanishka is bringing to their religion, Buddhist monks plan out the fourth Buddhist council and invite their emperor to preside over it. Given that Ashvaghosha, now a close friend of Kanishka, plays a prominent role in this council, it’s easy for them to convince the emperor join in, thereby adding legitimacy by his very presence. Kanishka also has a political reason for attending: making sure the fractiousness nature of Buddhist sects and beliefs don’t fracture his empire.

The council is then convened in Kanishka’s old stomping grounds of Kashmir. During this council, the monks talk religion and draft the latest sets of canonical writings, mostly to formalize changes to the Sarvastivadin, another sect of Buddhism to which Ashvaghosha likely belonged, but also those to formalize the beliefs of the Mahayana sect.

The funny thing is: if you Google the year for this fourth Buddhist council, you’ll probably get 72 AD, 7 years before Kanishka’s likely actual birth. This is that big contradiction I mentioned earlier. While the sources for the council are limited, the best way to make sense of the bigger picture is to place it here in the late 130s.

Whatever the case, Kanishka’s implicit support and explicit funding play a key role in the explosion of Buddhist followers over the next few centuries, both regionally and over in China. And believe me, we’ll get to that impact in future episodes.

Now, although Kanishka’s explicit funding did lead to iconic buildings like the aforementioned giant Kanishka Stupa, financially he lagged behind wealthy Buddhist benefactors in the state.

All combined, this is telling evidence about who Kanishka was as a person.

The new administrative post bestowed on Ashvaghosha and the subsequent construction of temples didn’t set the trend of constructing shrines, but followed them. And since our episodes aren’t about nations or religions, but people, it’s time to ask: If Kanishka never converted to Buddhism, why was he such a big supporter?

Frankly, it helped him rule. Buddhism is one of the world’s least violent religions, and the compassionate Mahayana branch further emphasized this belief. That doesn’t necessarily mean they’re pacified, but once Kanishka conquered a people, he gave them little reason to rebel. Evidence, admittedly a thing we lack in abundance here, suggests stability in the Kushan Empire during his reign, without any significant internal unrest. While he’s one of history’s least ideological rulers, that doesn’t mean he lacks for personality.

His ambitions, nomadic upbringing, and the decentralized style of rule gives off a hint of a pre-Genghis Khan, though Kanishka never dared anger China, much less try to conquer them. However big he may have dreamed, he was driven by realistic goals. Yet despite this affinity for near-constant conflict, he demonstrated an intellectual side too.

He paid a king’s ransom (or more accurately, gave a king’s discount) for the primo monk of his day, Ashvaghosha, and brought him into his inner circle. Similarly, he also invites numerous writers and scientists to his court and folds a few into his core advisory staff. Kanishka felt destined for greatness, but he never stops learning. His thirst for knowledge is eclipsed only by his hunger for land. The roots of these core traits are easiest to find in his upbringing.

Let’s go back to the beginning.

Although I stated earlier that Kanishka is the first son in a line of first sons to take the throne, I think that’s what he wanted the world to think. After all, the main evidence for this comes from the creation of coinage that he oversaw. Then, we add in that the Kushan rulers were probably polygamous. Without any named queens or princesses making their way to us today, a plausible conclusion is that there was no primary wife. This is historically rare but has happened, such as in the Ottoman and Mughal Empires.

So, several wives meant several kids... without a clear inheritance line. It wouldn’t surprise me if Kanishka was actually chosen as the best heir from a batch of sons at the time his father took the throne. It might also explain why Kushan rulers lasted so long—choosing an heir based on talent far surpasses the typical but myopic first-born inheritance plan when it comes to stability and well, everything.

All of this is to say: As a boy, Kanishka might not have known he would one day rule his father’s empire. Between growing up in multiple cities, having a Parthian mother, and ruling in Kashmir, it’s easy to see how the worldly Kanishka developed a tolerant attitude to his people. Everyone contributed to a greater whole and that greater whole fed an ambition that he could not sate.

Whether that makes his supposed ego or hotheadedness more or less likely is up for interpretation, but he comes across as a little too perfect otherwise. He even handles his one diplomatic entanglement with China exceptionally well.

Wishing to expand Kushan’s sphere of influence in 140 AD, he eyes the Tarim Basin. It’s a land is nominally under China’s domain, but is a western frontier for them, ruled by a small kingdom. Kanishka supports an exiled ruler of this kingdom and props him up on the throne. While that kingdom pays tribute to China, they’re technically under Kushan rule. This is a big win for Kanishka. He doesn’t have to fight a battle with China—one I’m pretty sure he realizes he’ll lose—but it gets his nation a little closer to the world’s Eastern Superpower. This positively impacts the flow of trade and provides closer access to technological advances that he uses civilly for infrastructure and militarily against Parthia and India.

As we near the end of Kanishka’s story and look back, I feel like he treated life like a game. Like he was playing some Ancient version of Pokemon where he had to catch ‘em all, and by all, instead of cute monsters, I mean the independent kingdoms and their great thinkers. He wrung every piece of life from the lands he could reach. He traveled the world as a young boy, discovered how far it stretched, and raced against time to hold as much of it as he could within his grasp.

Of course, he wanted to oversee the Fourth Buddhist Council. Not because he was Buddhist, but because he wanted to know what it was all about and craved the insights he’d glean from it about his people.

And he keeps playing this game until his death in about 150 AD. He brings in new philosophers, scientists, and artists to discuss the world. Buddhist temples crop up with greater density in the empire, and thus, along the routes of the silk road. He continues expanding his empire’s borders until the very end, although natural topography makes significant expansion difficult in the final decade of life.

After 23 years of near constant war, with recent successes dwarfed by their cost, it’s possible some of his advisors or an internal faction decided enough was enough. One historian writing about Kanishka a few centuries after his death suggested he was murdered within for warmongering. It’s possible, but given that he lived to 71, I think natural causes is a safer bet.

The lengthy rule of Kushan emperors points to a high regard for their supreme monarch. While that doesn’t mean everyone is automatically happy, Kanishka kept a pretty tight inner circle. The wrong person slipping in to the point of bypassing a couple dozen guards to assassinate the man strikes me as dubious. Usually, malcontents are happy to wait for nature to take its course when we’re talking about a elderly, long-seated ruler.

Another theory is Kanishka might’ve fallen in battle, and nothing would be more fitting. Surviving statues from the era unsurprisingly tend to showcase Kanishka as a warrior. In one such depiction, he’s wearing armor while holding a mace and sword. His military exploits catapulted the century-old Kushan state up to the world’s third-largest empire, trailing only Rome and China, each of whom had a millennium or so head start.

This leads to his greatest legacy: cementing a stable government during the silk road’s heydey, encouraging safer trade throughout the known world. And along that route would flow the idea of Mahayana Buddhism that he implicitly and explicitly helped to grow. Today, that branch encompasses over half the world’s Buddhists, and with approximately 250 million followers, it boasts as many worldwide adherents as Presbyterians, Lutherans, and Methodists combined.

Kanishka the Great, indeed.

Next episode, we’ll head back to Rome and finally experience history from a woman’s perspective. There’s a lot more documentation on men there, but Lucilla, the daughter of Marcus Aurelius and born in 150 AD, is one of the few women at this time with detailed writings.

You might recognize the name Lucilla from Connie Nielsen’s portrayal of her in the 2000 film Gladiator. Instead of seeing Rome and the craziness of Emperor Commodus from the eyes of a fictional Maximus Decimus, we’ll experience it all through the lens of this real-life intelligent woman who 100% would’ve made a much better emperor than her brother Commodus. Though that’s not saying much.

There’s a lot more to tell, so get hyped for the next episode as we travel back west.