The Early History of India, from 600 B.C. to the Muhammadan Conquest, including the Invasion of Alexander the Great c35.s1.16

c35.s1.16

Slavery is said to have been unknown among the ancient Tamils. The statement of Megasthenes that 'it was a great thing that all Indians were free, no slave existing in India' (*ante*, pp. 105 *n.*, 187 *n.*), probably was based on a rash generalization made from information which may have been strictly true for parts of the South.² His strange enumeration of the seven classes of the population, usually mistranslated 'castes', as being (1) philosophers, (2) agriculturists, (3) herdsmen, shepherds, and graziers, (4) artisans and traders, (5) the military, (6) the overseers, and (7) the councillors (*ante*, pp. 140, 141 *n.*), may be compared with the list of the 'five great assemblies', which checked the autocracy of Tamil kings, and comprised the people, priests, astrologers, physicians, and ministers.¹