On an altar from his temple discovered in Takht-i Sangin he is depicted in the form of the Greek river god Marsyas presumably introduced by soldiers and settlers who arrived in this area during the reigns of Alexander the Great and the Seleucids.

[10] The high status of Oxus among Eastern Iranian peoples in Central Asia according to Michael Shenkar might explain why Anahita, who was also associated with water, never reached a comparable importance in this region as she did in the west, despite being introduced to Bactria by the Sassanian dynasty.

[11] Henri-Paul Francfort also voiced support for the view that the high status of Oxus might be responsible for the scarcity of references to Anahita in the east.

[1] While Mary Boyce and Frantz Grenet described Oxus as a yazata in the 1990s,[17] more recently other authors, including Michael Shenkar[7] and Sun Wujun have characterized him as a deity who despite his Iranian origin did not belong to Zoroastrian tradition.

[20] The earliest known representation of this god is a statuette from a temple dedicated to him excavated in Takht-i Sangin in Tajikistan, which depicts him in the form of Greek Marsyas.

[7] Most likely Oxus was originally identified as a counterpart of Marsyas by Ionian Greeks who arrived in Central Asia as members of Alexander the Great's armies partaking in his Indian campaign.

[21] It has also been noted that many settlers from Magnesia, where Marsyas was popular as a river deity due to his association with a namesake tributary of Maeander, arrived in the east in Seleucid times.

[24] He notes that a horse with streams of water and fish beneath its hooves depicted on the Miho funerary couch might be an example of this convention.

[27] It has additionally been proposed that Triton-like figure depicted on Saka grave goods from Tillya Tepe and on Indo-Greek coin of Hippostratus can be identified as Oxus.

[21] According to a number of Muslim geographers from the ninth and tenth centuries, this area was customarily considered the beginning of Jayhun (Oxus), which might constitute a survival of an originally Bactrian tradition responsible for the selection of this location as a cult center of the related river god.

[9] Since Oxus is not mentioned in the Rabatak inscription, he was most likely not worshiped by Kushan rulers who arrived in Bactria from the north, though it is nonetheless presumed he remained popular among the Bactrians even at the time of the Muslim conquest of Transoxiana.

[35] While the temple dedicated to Oxus located in Takht-i Sangin was already abandoned at this time, it is nonetheless possible that this account documents the survival of traditions originally associated with it.

[7] According to Al-Biruni a festival known as Wakhšāngam was still held in the honor of "Wakhš (...), the angel who has the watch over the water, and especially over the river Oxus" in this area in the tenth century.