The Social and Military Position of the Ruling Caste in Ancient India, as Represented by the Sanskrit Epic c2.s5.241

c2.s5.241

* Compare the following examples: the *rathanīḍa* is for the charioteer alone in viii. 24. 38; 64. 28; vi. 53. 5 = ib. 114. 33; vii. 173. 5. The last example is copied from the two identical passages in the sixth book: *sārathiṃ cā’sya (cūrasya) bhallena rathanīḍād-apātayat*, ‘with one dart he made the charioteer fall from the nest.’ Compare also the cutting of the *yugamdhara* from the nest in vii. 16. 31. But when the knight falls, he ‘sinks down in the lap of the chariot,’ as does Droṇa (vii. 162. 42, *niṣasāda rathopasthe*: compare viii. 15. 42; 50. 47). And so it is said of a knight hard pressed, ‘he wavered not from the lap of the car’ (vi. 54. 17). ‘Down in the lap of the car’ sinks the king, and faints there (*kaçmalaṃ ca jagāma*); while the charioteer turns the steeds and retreats (vi. 58. 17). The scene comes again (in viii. 15. 43), where the driver, seeing his master senseless in the *upastha*, withdraws from the contest in the sight of all the army, and takes the king with him (although usually on such an occasion there is a rush to seize the wounded knight, as in viii. 62. 31-32, where the king crouches down in the *upastha* and all cry ‘seize the king’). So again in vi. 92. 36 the knight sinks in the *upastha*. So in R. vi. 51. 79 the knight is in the *upastha*; or the banner falls into it, R. vi. 86. 37. But in the last Epic case the distinction shows itself to be not a total one, but one of part and whole; for here the two drivers (*yantārāu*) are also wounded and fall in the ‘lap,’ and again a charioteer (*sūta*) falls from the ‘lap’ in v. 182. 3; the *sārathi* is in the *upastha* in iv. 33. 40; the *upastha* includes the *nīḍa* in iii. 21. 25-26. As, however, the drivers generally are represented in the ‘nest,’ and we know them to be in front (*syandanāgryeṇa* is even the position of Mātali, iii. 171. 28), and the knights are in the ‘lap,’ we may assume that in the narrower sense *upastha* denotes the owner’s place, and *nīḍa* the driver’s, although the ‘lap’ or ‘bottom’ may be taken to denote the whole of the underpart. The little roofed fore-chamber of the Assyrian war-car, as distinguished from the plain front of the Persian, would be perhaps too much to assume for the Hindu car; but a chamber, if unroofed, separated from the knight’s room, seems necessary. Compare besides the above the following: a joyful knight ‘as it were danced in the *upastha*’ (vi. 100. 46; 104. 29). A fainting knight sits in the *upastha*, braced against the flagpole (vi. 101. 47-48). Bhīma’s son is killed, and the body lies in the *upastha*, while the driver drives away with it (vii. 166. 38). Of Karṇa, when slain by Arjuna, the same words are used (*upāviçad rathopasthe*, viii. 53. 36). But when Çalya demands that his equality with Karṇa be recognized, he refuses to take the place of the ordinary charioteer, and so we find him in the *upastha*, whence he manages the reins (*çalyo rathopasthe raçmisamcārakovidāḥ*, viii. 79. 11: compare ib. 36. 10, *samipastham mā’roha tvam*, to Çalya). Again a knight leaps to the ground from the *upastha*, and fights with his club (ix. 11. 41). All the knights of the army are described as standing before the battle begins either ‘in the lap of a war-car or on the shoulder The chariot, as the preceding quotations show, swung so low that it was easy to leap out or in, or to force another out. We even read in a very vigorous rush of ‘all the knights deprived of their cars’: that is, flung out (vi. 48. 25). One knight leaps out to seize hold of one below (vi. 59. 100). Often the car is mounted, apparently in motion, by refuge-seeking friends, who climb up after losing their own cars. We thus find two brothers standing in one chariot after one of them had deserted his own because of slain horses.*