Heliodorus pillar
E491314
The Heliodorus pillar is an ancient stone column near Vidisha in central India, famous as one of the earliest known inscriptions recording a foreign Greek ambassador’s devotion to the Hindu god Vishnu.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Heliodorus pillar canonical | 2 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T5060359 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Heliodorus pillar Context triple: [Vidisha, hasArchaeologicalSite, Heliodorus pillar]
-
A.
Meridian Column
The Meridian Column is a historic monument in Hammerfest, Norway, commemorating the town’s role as a measurement point in the 19th-century Struve Geodetic Arc used to determine the Earth’s shape and size.
-
B.
Empress Column
Empress Column is a prominent and ornately shaped stalactite-stalagmite formation renowned as one of the signature natural limestone features within Luray Caverns in Virginia.
-
C.
Macuteo Obelisk
The Macuteo Obelisk is an ancient Egyptian obelisk now standing atop the fountain in Rome’s Piazza della Rotonda, directly in front of the Pantheon.
-
D.
Pompey’s Pillar
Pompey’s Pillar is a massive Roman triumphal column in Alexandria, Egypt, and one of the city’s most famous surviving ancient monuments.
-
E.
Ashoka Pillar
The Ashoka Pillar is an ancient stone column erected by Emperor Ashoka to mark the birthplace of the Buddha at Lumbini, Nepal, and bears one of his famous edicts.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Heliodorus pillar Target entity description: The Heliodorus pillar is an ancient stone column near Vidisha in central India, famous as one of the earliest known inscriptions recording a foreign Greek ambassador’s devotion to the Hindu god Vishnu.
-
A.
Meridian Column
The Meridian Column is a historic monument in Hammerfest, Norway, commemorating the town’s role as a measurement point in the 19th-century Struve Geodetic Arc used to determine the Earth’s shape and size.
-
B.
Empress Column
Empress Column is a prominent and ornately shaped stalactite-stalagmite formation renowned as one of the signature natural limestone features within Luray Caverns in Virginia.
-
C.
Macuteo Obelisk
The Macuteo Obelisk is an ancient Egyptian obelisk now standing atop the fountain in Rome’s Piazza della Rotonda, directly in front of the Pantheon.
-
D.
Pompey’s Pillar
Pompey’s Pillar is a massive Roman triumphal column in Alexandria, Egypt, and one of the city’s most famous surviving ancient monuments.
-
E.
Ashoka Pillar
The Ashoka Pillar is an ancient stone column erected by Emperor Ashoka to mark the birthplace of the Buddha at Lumbini, Nepal, and bears one of his famous edicts.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (47)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
ancient stone column
ⓘ
inscribed pillar ⓘ religious monument ⓘ |
| administeredBy | Archaeological Survey of India ⓘ |
| approximateDate | c. 113 BCE ⓘ |
| associatedDeity | Vishnu ⓘ |
| associatedRuler | Indo-Greek king Antialkidas ⓘ |
| associatedWith |
Greco-Indian cultural contacts
ⓘ
Indo-Greek relations ⓘ |
| builtBy | Heliodorus ⓘ |
| category |
Indo-Greek archaeology
ⓘ
ancient Indian inscriptions ⓘ |
| country | India ⓘ |
| culturalSignificance |
evidence of Greek adoption of Indian religious practices
ⓘ
important source for early history of Vaishnavism ⓘ |
| currentCondition | partially preserved ⓘ |
| date | 2nd century BCE ⓘ |
| dedicatedTo | Vishnu ⓘ |
| discoveredIn | 19th century ⓘ |
| erectedBy |
Heliodorus
ⓘ
linked to:
Heliodorus son of Dion
|
| function | votive column ⓘ |
| hasAmbassador | Heliodorus ⓘ |
| hasInscriptionAbout | devotion of Heliodorus to Vishnu ⓘ |
| hasInscriptionType | donative inscription ⓘ |
| hasTitleInInscription |
Garuda-dhvaja
ⓘ
linked to:
Vishnu dhvaja
|
| height | approximately 6 meters ⓘ |
| heritageStatus | protected monument of India ⓘ |
| historicalPeriod | Shunga period ⓘ |
| inscriptionLanguage | Prakrit ⓘ |
| inscriptionMentions |
Heliodorus son of Dion
ⓘ
King Antialkidas ⓘ
linked to:
King Antialcidas
Takshashila ⓘ
linked to:
Taxila
|
| inscriptionScript | Brahmi script ⓘ |
| locatedIn |
India
ⓘ
Madhya Pradesh ⓘ Vidisha ⓘ |
| material | stone ⓘ |
| namedAfter | Heliodorus ⓘ |
| near |
Sanchi
ⓘ
linked to:
Sāñcī
|
| notableFor |
early evidence of Vaishnavism
ⓘ
inscription of a Greek ambassador as a devotee of Vishnu ⓘ one of the earliest known Vaishnava inscriptions ⓘ |
| originalTopDecoration | Garuda capital ⓘ |
| religion | Hinduism ⓘ |
| symbol | Garuda standard ⓘ |
| underRuleOf |
King Bhagabhadra
ⓘ
Shunga dynasty ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Heliodorus pillar Description of subject: The Heliodorus pillar is an ancient stone column near Vidisha in central India, famous as one of the earliest known inscriptions recording a foreign Greek ambassador’s devotion to the Hindu god Vishnu.
Referenced by (2)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.