The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c19.s9.167

v1.c19.s9.167

Important handicrafts like the three above named and their branches, the workers in leather, i.e., the leather-dressers, the ‘painters,’ and others to the number of eighteen were organised into gilds (*seṇi*), according to Jātaka records; but it is to be regretted that only four of the eighteen crafts thus organised are specifically mentioned, ‘the woodworkers, the smiths, the leather-dressers, the painters and the rest, expert in various crafts’⁸. At the head of each gild was a president (*pamukha*) or alderman (*jeṭṭhaka*), and these leaders might be important ministers in attendance upon and in favour with the king. Occasionally these functionaries quarrelled, as at Sāvatthī⁹. And it may have been such quarrelling also at Benares that led to the institution of a supreme headship over all the gilds, an office doubled with that of treasurer (*bhaṇḍāgārika*) being founded at that city. It is of interest to note that this innovation in administrative organisation was made at a time when, according to the legend, the monarchy is represented as having been elective, not hereditary, and when the king who appointed, and the man who was appointed, were the sons, respectively, of a merchant and a tailor¹⁰! The nature and extent of the authority of the *pamukha* over the gilds is nowhere clearly shown. Nor is it clear to what extent the duties of a *bhaṇḍāgārika*, lit. ‘houser of goods,’ coincided with our word ‘treasurer.’ It was not confined to the custody of moneys, for the *Saṅgha* had officials so named¹; hence it is possible that it referred to a supervision of the goods made or dealt with by a gild or gilds and not only to the king’s exchequer.