Nothing is known of his life, except the statement in Plutarch that he declined to visit the court of Alexander the Great.
Having rivalled the exploits of Caesar, he now longed to follow in the steps of Alexander the Great.
The governors appointed by Alexander were, in the west of the empire, exclusively Macedonians; in the east, members of the Old Persian nobility were still among the satraps at Alexander's death, Atropates in Media, Phrataphernes in Parthia and Hyrcania, 1 For the events which brought this empire into being see Alexander The Great.
In compiling his map he was able to avail himself of the information obtained by the bematists (surveyors who determined distances by pacing) who accompanied Alexander the Great on his campaigns; of the results of the voyage of Nearchus from the Indus to the Euphrates, and of the " Periplus " of Scylax of Caryanda, which described the coast from between India and the head of the Arabian Gulf.
It afterwards became a province (Margiana) of the Graeco-Syrian, Parthian and Persian kingdoms. On the Margus - the Epardus of Arrian and now the Murghab - stood the capital of the district, Antiochia Margiana, so called after Antiochus Soter, who rebuilt the city founded by Alexander the Great.
