The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c23.38

v1.c23.38

As lord of the land the king is a Zeus Agamemnon, a human divinity incorporating the essence of the deities Indra, Vāyu, Yama, Varuṇa, Agni, etc., that is of the gods who protect the world in the eight directions. In other words, his chief function as lord is to protect, and he protects as ‘a great deity in human form’ (Manu, vii, 8). He has, to aid him, seven or eight councillors of hereditary office (‘whose ancestors have been servants of kings’), with whom he daily consults as to affairs of state and religion. His prime minister should be a learned priest; he should appoint officials over all public works, mines, manufactures, storehouses, etc. Various royal monopolies are mentioned (salt is one of them). His officers must be brave and honest, and he himself must be brave and lead his troops personally into battle, where he is to make it his duty to 'kill kings,' for those kings go to heaven who seek to slay each other in battle and fight strenuously for that purpose (Manu, VII, 89). As overlord, the king receives a share of the booty won in battle, and it is his duty to distribute such booty as has not been taken singly among the soldiers. One military officer and a company of soldiers he should place as a guard over each village and town, to protect them. There should be a lord of one village, a lord of ten, (of twenty), of a hundred, and a lord (or lords) of a thousand. It is the duty of the lord of one village, *grāmika*, to report all crimes to the *daçapa* or lord of ten, and the lord of ten shall report likewise to the (lord of twenty, and he to the) lord of a hundred, and he to the lord of a thousand. As much land as suffices for one family shall be the income of the lord of one village and so on to the lord of a thousand, who shall enjoy the revenue of a town. All these men (it is said) are probably knaves and must be spied upon continually through the agency of a general superintendent in every town, who shall scrutinise the conduct of all the governing lords, 'for the servants of kings appointed to protect generally become rascals who steal the property of others' (*ibid.* 123). The sum collected from his subjects by a just king (as taxes) is a fiftieth part of the increment on cattle and gold, and the eighth, sixth, or twelfth part of the crops; while common artisans pay tax by a day's work monthly.