State and Government in Ancient India c13.39

c13.39

In one place we get a reference to several kings meeting together in one *samiti*.³ In another place we get the significant statement that he alone becomes a king whose leadership of the state is assented to by *other kings*.⁴ The *kings* here referred to were probably the heads of the Kshatriya families, entitled to coronation and the state contemplated by this passage is one which was the prototype of the later republics already described above. The sovereign power of course rested not in the populace in general but in the aristocratic leaders of the cantons who were fairly numerous. If the kingship or leadership assented to by them became hereditary in the course of time, the normal monarchy of the later period was evolved. If, on the other hand, power was delegated to their leader by the members of the aristocracy for a short time, and if the leadership was not allowed to become hereditary, then circumstances were created which were to develop into the Kshatriya republics of the later times known as *gaṇas* or *saṁghas*. It is interesting to add that the kingship that is disclosed in Homer was similarly replaced by aristocracy at *c.* 700 B. C. on account of the power passing into the hands of a relatively small number of privileged persons.¹