India as Known to Panini: A Study of the Cultural Material in the Ashtadhyayi c8.s12.1

c8.s12.1

The means of transport are referred to as *vahya* (III.¹.102) or *vāhana*, which was of two kinds, *viz.* vehicles for carrying load on land (as in the *sūtra Vāhanam āhitāt*, VIII.4.8.), and means of transport in water called *vāhana* or *uda-vāhana* (VI.3.58). The name of the load-bearing cart was specified according to the nature of its load (*āhita*), *e.g. ikshu-vāhaṇa*, *śara-vāhaṇa*, *darbha-vāhaṇa*. *Śakaṭa* denoted the waggon for carrying goods, with sturdy bulls called *śākaṭa* (IV.4.80) yoked to it. (Cf. *Vedic Index*, II.345). Patañjali refers to caravans of carts (*śakaṭa-sārtha*) passing along highways (III.2.115; II.120). In Buddhist literature numerous references to merchants conveying their goods and merchandise across the country, in caravans of 500 carts are met with, indicating the growing importance of wheeled traffic (*śakaṭa*) for transport of heavy goods.