DescriptionChandragupta Maurya Empire c.290 BCE v2.png	English: Extent of Chandragupta's empire, with realistic extent, and maximum extent based on a literal reading of territories ceeded by Seleucus. Critical assessment Jansari (2023), Chandragupta Maurya: The creation of a national hero in India, p.33, warns that "the dependence on a small group of sources from only one literary tradition necessitates a cautious approach to these texts and the events they describe." (Jansari According to Tarn (1922), The Greeks in Bactria and India, p.100, Smith's idea that Seleucus handed over more of what is now southern Afghanistan is an exaggeration originating in a statement by Pliny the Elder in his Geographia VI, 69, referring not specifically to the lands received by Chandragupta, but rather to the various opinions of geographers regarding the definition of the word "India." According to Kosmin (2014), The Land of the Elephant Kings: Space, Territory, and Ideology in Seleucid Empire, p.33: "Seleucus transferred to Chandragupta's kingdom the easternmost satrapies of his empire, certainly Gandhara, Parapamisadae, and the eastern parts of Gedrosia, and possibly also Arachosia and Aria as far as Herat." Gedrosia V.A. Smith (1914), Early History of India,p.151: "The satrapy of Gedrosia (or Gadrosia) extended far to the west, and probably only the eastern part of it was annexed by Chandragupta. The Malin [Malan] range of mountains, which Alexander experienced such difficulty in crossing, would have furnished a natural boundary.
Date	30 November 2024
Source	Own work
Author	Joshua Jonathan

Tarn further refers to Eratosthenes, who states (in Tarn words) that "Alexander [...] took away from Iran the parts of these three satrapies which lay along the Indus and made of them separate [...] governments or province; it was these which Seleucus ceded, being districts predominantly Indian in blood. In Gedrosia the boundary is known: the country ceded was that between the Median Hydaspes (probably the Purali [Porali]) and the Indus."

Aria The acquisition of Aria (modern Herat) is disputed. Tarn (1922), p.100, explicitly criticises V.A. Smith: "Extravagant ideas have been put forward as to what Seleucus did cede [...] The worst has been that of V. A. Smith, who gave Chandragupta the satrapies of Gedrosia, Arachosia, Paropamisadae, and Aria on the strength of Pliny VI, 69, a historical absurdity of unknown origin."

According to Raychaudhuri & Mukherjee (1996), p.594, it "has been wrongly included in the list of ceded satrapies by some scholars [...] on the basis of wrong assessments of the passage of Strabo [...] and a statement by Pliny." According to John D Grainger (2014, p. 109), "Seleucus "must [...] have held Aria", and furthermore, his "son Antiochos was active there fifteen years later".

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