The Political Institutions and Theories of the Hindus: A Study in Comparative Politics c11.t26.11

c11.t26.11

In the third place, persons rearing pigs and cocks had to contribute 50 per cent of their stock. Those who had sheep and goat farms were taxed 16⅔ per cent, and herdsmen who reared cows and buffaloes 10 per cent.² In the fourth place, a special levy of 500 *paṇas* ($ 125) was raised from merchants in diamonds, horses, and elephants. Dealers in cotton goods had to pay 400 *paṇas*, dealers in grains and liquids 300, traders in glass and glassware 200, artisans and carpenters 100, and dealers in mud-pots, inn-keepers and small retailers 50.² In the fifth place, dramatists (and theater managers?) as well as prostitutes had to surrender half their annual earnings.² And lastly, as in Athens,³ the government exacted extraordinary donations and gifts from temples and religious establishments.⁴ The process might almost be described as a legalized looting of ecclesiastical property by the secular authorities.