and Khotan in Sinkiang. The artefacts found along the Karakoram highway also establish that this was the route taken by Buddhist monks travelling to China on their mission to spread Buddhism. Merchants followed the missionaries, so this became a major commercial route for the import of Chinese silk and horses from the West into India. Indian merchants established themselves in various towns in Central Asia and seized the opportunity to become intermediaries in the luxury trade between China and the Roman Empire, since merchants from the West did not want to venture further east beyond Central Asia.
Kushana kings, mostly with their names ending with –shka (among them Huvishka and Vasishka as well as later Kanishka and even Vasudeva), ruled for at least one century more, but nothing much is known about them. Clearly the empire was beginning to break down, and the satraps (the Kushanas also continued the practice of appointing satraps to govern the provinces) were able to set themselves up as independent rulers in various regional capitals. Art and Literature During the reign of Kushanas, there was great creative energy when art and literature flourished. BAY OF BENGAL ARABIAN SEA KUSHAN EMPIRE I N D I A N O C E A N N S W E Capital cities Kushan Empire Cauvery Krishna Tapti Son Godavari Narmada Yamuna Ganges Brahmaputra Banas Chambal Sutlej Beas Cheneb Indus Indus Jhelum Ravi Krishna T u n g a b h a d r a Mahanadi Yarlung (Brahmaputra) Junagadh SURASHTRA BHARUKACHH AVANTI Sui Vihar Indraprastha Mirath Nigliva Prayaga Sanchi KALINGA Pratishthana(Paithan) AMRAVATI Kasi Sarnath Patliputra MAGADHA KAPICA GANDHARA Peshawar Taxila Bagram KASHMIR HINDU KUSH Mathura MARU CHOLAS PANDYAS CHERAS SIND KACHHA Map not to scale A n d a m a n a n d N i c o b a r ( I n d i a ) L a k s h a d w e e p ( I n d i a ) XI History - Lesson - - Polity and Society in Post-Mauryan Period ago in South India, most probably belonged to this