Hindu Administrative Institutions c8.s1.14

c8.s1.14

the third year of his age when the ceremony of tonsure was generally performed the prince was placed under the guidance of good teachers who instructed him in the alphabet (lipi) and mathematics (samkhyāna). In his eleventh year, the age for investiture ceremony,¹ he was taught a course of higher studies comprising the three Vedas, anvikṣikī or logic, vārtta or economics, and daṇḍanīti or science of politics. There were separate teachers, perhaps specialists, in charge of each subject. The very fact that the latter two subjects which were secular in character were taught by adhyakṣas or heads of administrative departments, vaktāraḥ and prayoktāraḥ, i.e., expounders and administrators of law, affords tangible proof that the educational training was no less practical than theoretical. Nor were these alone the subjects studied and pursued. Education was not considered complete if the prince had not either himself studied, or heard the Itihāsas read to him; besides he was taught the various branches of military science relating to the use and handling of different arms and armaments. Even here there was no indiscriminate learning of this subject now and that afterwards. A time-table was previously drawn up and the studies were pursued according to it. The mornings were generally fixed for learning the theory and practice of arms. The afternoon was devoted to the hearing of the Itihāsa.²