PANDAIE THE DAUGHTER OF HERACLES WHO BECAME QUEEN OF THE PANDYAN KINGDOM

 

In Greek Religion , Pandaie or Pandae (Ancient Greek: Πανδαίη) was a daughter of Heracles who was born in India, and became the ruler of a kingdom in South India. In the account of the historian Megasthenes, she was a queen of the Pandya dynasty.

Pandaie was said to have been assigned a kingdom in India by her father, who established specific laws for it, and to become its eponym. According to Megasthenes, she was also given by Heracles 500 elephants, 4000 horses and infantry of 130 000.

According to Pliny the Elder, Pandaie was the only female child of Heracles (which, however, contradicts the accounts that mention Macaria, Eucleia and Manto as his daughters), and was therefore especially favored by Him. For that reason He made her queen of the Pandae, who since then became the only nation throughout India to be ruled by women. Pandaie's descendants, Pliny relates, reigned over three hundred cities and commanded an army of 5,100 plus five hundred elephants.

Polyaenus informs that Heracles allotted to Pandaie the southern part of India which is by the sea, subdividing it into 365 cantons and imposing on each a yearly tax that was to be paid on a certain fixed day of the year. Should a canton refuse to pay, other ones would be obliged to compensate the loss.

Pandyas are also mentioned in the inscriptions of Maurya emperor Ashoka (3rd century BCE). In his inscriptions (2nd and 13th Major Rock Edict), Ashoka refers to the peoples of south India – the Cheras, Pandyas and Satiyaputras. These polities, possibly not part of the Maurya empire, were on friendly terms with Ashoka:

The conquest by dharma has been won here, on the borders, and even six hundred yojanas (5,400–9,600 km) away, where the Greek king Antiochos rules, beyond there where the four kings named Ptolemy, Antigonos, Magas and Alexander rule, likewise in the south among the Cholas, the Pandyas, and as far as Tamraparni river.

(Major Rock Edict No.13), Ven. S. Dhammika translation.

Everywhere within the conquered province of King Piyadasi (Ashoka), the beloved of the gods, as well as in the parts occupied by the faithful, such as Chola, Pandya, Satiyaputra, and Keralaputra, even as far as Tambapanni (Ceylon) and within the dominions the Greek (of which Antiochus generals are the rulers ) everywhere the heaven-beloved Raja Piyadasi’s double system of medical aid is established- both medical aid for men and medical aid for animals.

Major Rock Edict No.2), James Prinsep translation.

Edited from Wikipedia