The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c17.52

v1.c17.52

The power of the king cannot have been in normal circumstances arbitrary or probably very great. There stood beside him as the mode of expression of the will of the people the assembly, which is denoted by the terms *samiti* and *sabhā* in the Saṃhitā. It has been proposed by Ludwig¹ to see in these two terms the designations of two different forms of assembly: the one would be the assembly of the whole people, while the other would be an analogue of the Homeric council of elders, a select body to which the great men of the tribe, the Maghavans, alone would go to take counsel with the king. Zimmer², on the other hand, sees in the *samiti* the popular assembly of the tribe, in the *sabhā* the assembly of the village. But neither view appears to be acceptable. There is no distinction in the texts which would justify us in contrasting *sabhā* and *samiti* in either of the ways suggested: rather it seems the *samiti* is the assembly of the people for the business of the tribe, the *sabhā* particularly the place of assembly, which served besides as a centre of social gatherings. The king's presence in the *samiti* is clearly referred to; and there seems no reason to doubt that on great occasions the whole of the men of the tribe gathered there to deliberate, or at least to decide, on the courses laid before them by the great men of the tribe. But we are reduced to analogy with the Homeric assembly for any conception of the action of the assembly; for, perhaps owing to the nature of the sources, nothing is known of its part in Vedic life. If indeed the king was ever elected by the cantons, the election took place in the *samiti*; but the theory that the king was ever elected has, as has been already said, nothing to support it.