The State in Ancient India: A Study in the Structure and Practical Working of Political Institutions in North India in Ancient Times c13.34

c13.34

The cumulative evidence of coins and inscriptions brings out the existence of a ruling class which occupied a two-fold position. The Ruling Class, Mahârathis, Mahâbhojas and Mahâsenâpatis, are clearly high officers of state at the capital, provincial or district governors. Elsewhere they appear to be feudal lords striking their own coins and making grants of land on their own authority. The line between direct employees of state and vassals is rather faint. Perhaps there never was a clear demarcation. One class faded insensibly into the other. The tendency to the hereditary transmission of office would bring the status of governors nearer that of feudal chiefs. The system of payment in land was another powerful factor in the same direction. An inscription of Siri Puḷumāvi of the second century A.D. shows military officers holding large fiefs of land.¹ Marriage alliance between the royal and aristocratic families would tend to produce the same result.² Polygamy, always practised by aristocrats in ancient India, would accelerate the conversion of the whole aristocracy into a sort of clan. The government of the state would tend to become government by the clan. It is clear that there were numerous local dynasties under the Andhra kings. Feudatories assumed titles like those of Cuṭukaḍānanda, Joy of the city of the Cuṭus and Muḍānanda, Joy of the Muṇḍas. In the inscriptions there occur a number of dignitaries, Amātyas, Mahāmātras and Bhaṇḍāgārikas, who correspond to officers with similar designations in other inscriptions and in literature. They acted as ministers, treasurers and heads of departments at the central, provincial or feudal capitals. There was a regular secretarial staff, comprising Lekhakas or clerks.¹