The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c26.189

v1.c26.189

Nearchus (?) had already noted that Indian kings were not saluted, as Persian kings were, by prostration, but by the persons approaching them raising their hands—the Greek attitude in prayer⁴. A great occasion at court, according to one source before Strabo, was when the king washed his hair. Everyone then tried to outdo his fellows by the magnificence of his presents⁵. Clitarchus —a questionable authority—described the pageantry of a court festival—the elephants bedizened with gold and silver, chariots drawn by horses, and ox-waggons, the army in full array, the display of precious vessels of gold and silver, many of them studded with gems. Collections of animals of all kinds were also a great feature, panthers and lions. There were great waggons carrying whole trees to which a variety of birds bright in plumage or lovely in song were attached¹. Animals, according to another source, were a usual form of offering to bring to the king. ‘The Indians do not think lightly of any animal, tame or wild.’ And the king apparently accepted all kinds, not rare ones only, but cranes and geese and ducks and pigeons. Or one might bring wild ones, deer and antelopes or rhinoceroses². On one great annual festival amusement took the form of butting matches between rams or wild bulls or rhinoceroses, or fights between elephants³. Races provoked great excitement. They usually took place between chariots to each of which one horse between two oxen was harnessed. There was very heavy betting on these occasions, in which the king himself and his nobles led the way. And their example was followed on a humbler scale by the crowd of spectators⁴. The king—if Megasthenes is the source, we may understand Chandragupta—had a guard of twenty-four elephants. When he went forth to do justice, the first elephant was trained to do obeisance. At a word from the driver and a touch with the goad, it gave some military salute as the king passed⁵.