Theodorus was a "meridarch

Meridarch

A meridarch or meridarches was the civil governor of a province in the Hellenistic world , and could be translated as "Divisional Commissioner"...

" (Civil Governor of a province) in the Swat

Swat (Pakistan)

Swat is a valley and an administrative district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, located close to the Afghan-Pakistan border. It is the upper valley of the Swat River, which rises in the Hindu Kush range. The capital of Swat is Saidu Sharif, but the main town in the Swat valley is Mingora...

 province of the Indo-Greek kingdom

Indo-Greek Kingdom

The Indo-Greek Kingdom or Graeco-Indian Kingdom covered various parts of the northwest regions of the Indian subcontinent during the last two centuries BC, and was ruled by more than 30 Hellenistic kings, often in conflict with each other...

 in the northern Indian sub-continent, probably sometime between 100 BCE and the end of Greek rule in Gandhara in 55 BCE.

He is only known from a dedication written in kharoshthi on a relic vase inserted in a stupa

Stupa

A stupa is a mound-like structure containing Buddhist relics, typically the remains of Buddha, used by Buddhists as a place of worship....

 in the Swat area of Gandhara

Gandhara

Gandhāra , is the name of an ancient kingdom , located in northern Pakistan and eastern Afghanistan. Gandhara was located mainly in the vale of Peshawar, the Potohar plateau and on the Kabul River...

, dated to the 1st century BCE (line-for-line translation):

"Theudorena meridarkhena

pratithavida

ime sarira

Sakamunisa bhagavato

bahu-jana-stitiye"

"The meridarch Theodorus

has enshrined

these relics

of Lord Shakyamuni,

for the welfare of the mass of the people"

This inscription represents one of the first known mention of the Buddha as a deity, using the Indian bhakti

Bhakti

In Hinduism Bhakti is religious devotion in the form of active involvement of a devotee in worship of the divine.Within monotheistic Hinduism, it is the love felt by the worshipper towards the personal God, a concept expressed in Hindu theology as Svayam Bhagavan.Bhakti can be used of either...

 word Bhagavat ("Lord", "All-embracing personal deity"), suggesting the emergence of Mahayana

Mahayana

Mahāyāna is one of the two main existing branches of Buddhism and a term for classification of Buddhist philosophies and practice...

 doctrines in Buddhism

Buddhism

Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...

.

It is also one of the examples of direct involvement of the Greeks with the Buddhist religion in India.

Theodorus is considered as contemporary or slightly posterior to another Indo-Greek named Heliodorus, whose c.100 BCE inscriptions have been preserved in the Heliodorus pillar

Heliodorus pillar

The Heliodorus pillar is a stone column that was erected around 110 BCE in central India in Vidisha near modern Besnagar, by Heliodorus, a Greek ambassador of the Indo-Greek king Antialcidas to the court of the Sunga king Bhagabhadra...

.