Age of the Nandas and Mauryas c9.s40.8

c9.s40.8

This account of city-government does not correspond *prima facie* to anything known from Indian sources. It has been pointed out² rightly that while in the pages of the *Arthaśāstra* we come across individual officials in charge of more or less the same duties as are discharged by some of the boards of Megasthenes' account, there is no trace whatever of a body of thirty dividing into six pentads ; and as the same arrangement recurs in his description of military administration, it has been suggested that Megasthenes gave a schematic and idealised account far removed from realities. On the other hand, urban administration has always been different from rural, and there is evidence that at the time of Alexander's invasion some of the larger cities had an administrative system very like what Megasthenes has detailed. Thirty deputies from Nysa accompanied Akouphis on his visit to Alexander; and, ‘from the Oxydrakai came the leading men of their cities, and their provincial governors, besides 150 of their most eminent men, entrusted with full powers to conclude a treaty³’. It is possible that in these republican cities, the entire aristocracy had a voice in government and the executive work was carried on by groups of five ; for the *pañchāyat* is after all a very widespread Indo-Aryan institution⁴. The rise of the Mauryan empire did bring about a considerable change, and it is possible that Megasthenes was either not fully abreast of the new situation, or probably his account is coloured by his knowledge of the historians of Alexander.