The Social and Military Position of the Ruling Caste in Ancient India, as Represented by the Sanskrit Epic c2.s5.35

c2.s5.35

Interesting as the exhibition of morale given by the quotations above may be (and it seems to me that the poets have enabled us to get a tolerably clear idea of this, and portrayed the fighting force with what we may assume to be a true imitation of the actual conditions obtaining in Hindu warfare), it only brings out the more strongly our lack of information in regard to the real war-life of the king’s common soldiers. What we do know may be briefly recapitulated here, before we proceed to the subject of military tactics. As to the primitive Hindu soldier of the pre-Epic period, how he was supported, what he did in peace, etc., we know next to nothing save by inference, and by works too late to be considered as valid for the Epic period. We judge that his pay was a part of the booty; that at first he was a fraction of the common folk, and in peace was not different from his neighbors; tending cattle, offering sacrifice, repelling assaults, making forays, as times and wishes twirled his inclination. But gradually the cattle were left to others that preferred a quiet life; agriculture arose, and caste gratings separated thenceforth and forever the hired soldiers from the ranchman and the farmer. Now he belonged wholly to the king, and drew his pay from his valor, or, later still, from a regular stipend, plus what (with certain exceptions) his individual bravery enabled him to seize as private booty on the field of war. In the Epic period (and the reports of the Greeks support the native authorities) he lives a life in part beautifully resembling that of the German soldier. In war he fights as he is bid. In peace he amuses himself, and does nothing else. He receives a regular wage (which ought to be paid in advance), but is not employed by the king on the strength of this support to attend to civil business. His life must be free from business affairs, and his wife is supported by a pension when he is slain. His position theoretically is inferior only to the priest’s, and in social practice inferior also only to his aristocratic superiors of the same caste.*