MAN WEARING INDO-SCHYTHIAN ROBE
Fashions of dress change very frequently in the modern world; you can see this every year in Bryant Park. Today, this is done consciously and with a specific purpose. Traditionally, fashions changed more graduallly, and mostly through contact with other cultures.
This statue is from the region of extreme north-western India, near the Silk Road, and dates from about 400 CE. It is the statue of a man carrying fruit or flowers in his hand. Most importantly, he is wearing a draped robe over his tunic. Draped robes were not the fashion in this region before this time.
-- Compare this earlier Roman and Greek statues. Are they similar?
-- How would might you explain such similarities?
Source: Peshawar Museum, no. 1710. In John M. Rosenfield, The Dynastic Arts of the Kushans (University of California Press, 1967): figure 66.