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Intercourse between India and the Western World from the Earliest Times to the Fall of Rome c8.s3: Appendix III. The Accuracy of Megasthenes

Intercourse between India and the Western World from the Earliest Times to the Fall of Rome c8.s3

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Appendix III. The Accuracy of Megasthenes

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In view of Strabo's attacks upon the veracity of Megasthenes, it is curious to find that his account of the constitution of Chandragupta finds close confirmation in many details in a Hindu book on Politics, traditionally ascribed to Kauṭilya or Cāṇakya, the famous Brahmin minister of the Maurya Emperor. This work is the Kauṭilīya Artha Śāstra. In this book we find the king's palace described very much after the manner of Megasthenes, with its moats, ramparts and towers. The king is surrounded by a bodyguard of "women armed with bows," as Megasthenes says. (Artha Śāstra, II. 3.)

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The Artha Śāstra describes the highly organized bureaucracy in terms very similar to those employed by Megasthenes, but in greater detail. Thus Megasthenes tells us that the district officers were in charge of the forests, temples, harbours, mines, roads, etc. He also describes the six Boards or Pañcāyats who managed municipal affairs. Kauṭilya describes no less than fifteen officials or boards of officials who supervised municipal affairs. But the general duties assigned to them are nearly the same. Thus Kauṭilya describes a Superintendent of Commerce and a Superintendent of Warehouses, who between them managed the market, fixed the market-prices, regulated the trade in agricultural produce, levied the subsidies for provisioning the army, and collected the royal tithes on goods bought and sold. These were almost precisely the duties assigned to the first, fourth, fifth and sixth boards in the polity described by Megasthenes.

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The Artha Śāstra mentions a Superintendent of Courtezans and of Public Gambling, two functions of the police department not occurring in Megasthenes. But Megasthenes tells us how the king's agents employed the courtezans to obtain information. This ancient profession was, as in most Indian polities, treated as a recognized trade, taxed, inspected, and utilized by Government. But on the whole, the two accounts supplement one another in a remarkable manner, though the Artha Śāstra increases our opinion of the severity of Chandragupta’s government. The people were supervised and taxed with relentless severity.

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On one important point Kauṭilya supplies information which supplements Megasthenes very considerably. This is with regard to the Board of Shipping. The Port Commissioner supervised sea and river-traffic and ferries. Fishermen, merchants and travellers, were all subjected to taxation and the ferries were in the hands of the Government. The fords were guarded by pickets, who prevented suspects from entering or leaving. It was the duty of the Harbour Masters to assist ships in distress, and of those in charge of the ferries to see that they were not used when the river was in a dangerous state.

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(For a more detailed comparison, see *The Ancient Hindu Polity*, by N. N. Law (Longmans, 1914), especially pp. xxxv—xlv, Introduction. For text, see R. Shāma Śāstri’s Edition, Mysore, 1909.)

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[Since the above chapter was written, an article by Dr D. B. Spooner has appeared in *J.R.A.S.* 1915, p. 63. The author, who is in charge of the excavations at Pāṭaliputra, shews that the Persian element therein is far more extensive than is commonly supposed. The palace and other buildings are modelled on the palace of Darius at Persepolis, and seem to have been the work of Persian masons. The caves at Barābar etc. (Hiuen Tsiang’s “stone-chambers”) are copied from the Royal Tombs of the Persian kings. Asura Maya, the demon builder of the *Mahābhārata* (see Hopkins, *Great Epic of India*, p. 391), is the demon who according to Hiuen Tsiang built Aśoka’s palace, and is no other than Ahura Mazda of Persia, by whose grace Xerxes built his palace (Curzon, *Persia*, II. p. 156).]

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