The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c14.s8.t1.9

c14.s8.t1.9

It was therefore as an integral feature of the Hindu societal tradition that by following the profession of arms the Mores of Jawli, the Savants of Wari, the Ghorpādes of Mudhol, the Nimbalkārs of Phaltan, the Jādhavas of Sindkhed, the Jedhkes, the Mānes, the Dāfles, and others rose into prominence in the Maratha world.⁴ Śivāji the Bhonsle himself belonged to a low caste (cultivator). And prior to coronation he had to be dubbed a Kṣatriya. Not only Śivāji but all his successors down to the last Peshwa had to recruit the army from the lower tribes or castes. Husbandmen, carpenters, shopkeepers, men of mean birth always constituted the backbone of the Maratha army, as says the *Tarikh-i-Ibrahim* towards the end of the eighteenth century. 'All through the ages in India as elsewhere the military profession has functioned as a most potent "social ladder," to use a modern socio-logical category.