The Mauryan Polity c13.s11.5

c13.s11.5

It is amusing to find the remark of Megasthenes who says "since they have no slaves they have more need to have children around them to attend to their wants."¹ This is only an assumption of the Greek visitor but not a fact. It is not correct to state that there were no slaves in those days. Megasthenes had apparently confused slaves and servants. He has taken servants to be slaves attributing the ideas of his own country. Every family could not afford to have servants, and absence of servants in certain families must have obviously driven Megasthenes to this conclusion, or his statement in this respect is incorrect as many others are. But what is more important is that we find coincidences between the two versions as regards the institution of marriage.¹