Town Planning in Ancient India c12.22

c12.22

According to the Mānasāra and the Mayamata a village, exactly as a fort or a town, is defended by a girdle of walls and moats.¹ But the lexicographer Bharata's definition of a 'grāma' or village clearly asserts that a village is devoid of them: "It is an abode of many people, such as Brāhmaṇs and others, without any wall or ditch."² Whether this lack of fortification in a village postulates a later stage in the social and political development of the land when peace and tranquillity reigned throughout its length and breadth, cannot be definitely ascertained at this remote period of time, especially if we presume the correctness of the cautious opinion of Macdonell that in Vedic India "the villages were probably open, though perhaps a fort (pura) might on occasion be built inside."³ The difficulty in assuming such postulates increases when we meet with unmistakable traces of fortifications in good many antique villages in Southern India.