Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan, or the Central and Western Rajput States of India v1.c18.9

v1.c18.9

In remarking the curious coincidence between the habits, notions, and governments of Europe in the Middle Ages, and those of Rajasthan, it is not absolutely necessary we should conclude that one system was borrowed from the other ; each may, in truth, be said to have the patriarchal form for its basis. I have sometimes been inclined to agree with the definition of Gibbon, who styles the system of our ancestors the offspring of chance and barbarism. “Le système féodal, assemblage monstrueux de tant de parties que le tems et l’hazard ont réunies, nous offre un objet très compliqué : pour l’étudier il faut le décomposer.”² This I shall attempt.