Tochari

alternative Tokhari

1. pluralplural onlyAn ancient people of Bactria.

   The Country of the Tochari is now call’d Tochariſtan.

   1725, Bernard de Montfaucon, The Antiquities of Italy, page 327

   3 more examples

   Then followe the Tochari, and then the Phurij, and the Seres, nations altogyther barbarous, neyther inſtructed in any kynde of learning, neyther gyuen to ſtudie, or exerciſe of any thyng, but onely wandring in wylde and deſerte places, […]

   1572, The Surveye of the World, folio 14r

   The Tochari were mountaineers, on the declivity which regards Bactriana; and Tokariſtan is ſtill the name of the country between the mountains and the Gihon, or Oxus.

   1792, The Monthly Review, volume 9, page 44

   Meanwhile Bactria submitted to the Tochari of Western writers (Sanskrit, Tukhāra). They have been sometimes supposed to have been a branch of the Turkish tribes, while the Hiung-nu have been seen as Mongols, the forerunners of the Hūnas and Chionites. It was a section of the Tocharians who later followed the Greeks across the Hindu-kush and created the great Kushan empire in North India.

   1957, Osbert Guy Stanhope Crawford, editor, Antiquity, volumes 31–32, page 137

   Synonyms: Tocharian, Tokhar, Tukhara, Tukhar