State and Government in Ancient India c9.s1.7

c9.s1.7

In the description of the coronation, the ritual is sometimes described as securing *rājya*, *svarājya*, *bhaujya*, *vairājya*, *mahārājya* and *sāmrājya* to one and the same individual.¹ A doubt, therefore, naturally arises as to whether these terms really denoted different types of states or monarchies. It is, however, not unlikely that it is the desire to emphasise the omnipotence of the ritual that is responsible for the priest claiming that the king who is receiving the holy coronation from him, can attain to all the different positions referred to above. This conjecture becomes more probable when we remember that a passage in the *Aitareya Brāhmaṇa* states that the different types of States like *rājya* *bhaujya*, *vairājya*, and *sāmrājya* flourished in different provinces of the country.²