The Political Institutions and Theories of the Hindus: A Study in Comparative Politics c9.s1.t2: (b) Samûha ("group-person")
The Political Institutions and Theories of the Hindus: A Study in Comparative Politics c9.s1.t2
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(b) Samûha ("group-person")
c9.s1.t2.1
In the later literature of political institutions the term *saṃgha* seems to have dropped out of general use. The most "generic" term for *polis* with the authors of the *smṛiti-śâstras*, at any rate, is *samûha*. In the fourth century A. C. Yâjnavalkya¹ used it generically for any corporation. *Samûhas* were known to be divided into various classes differing from one an other according to the nature of objects for which the association was instituted or the kind of persons organizing themselves into a *polis*. One of these was the *śreṇî*, i. e. gild, a second was the *naigama* (also *nigama*) or body of traders (the "gild merchant"), and a third was the *pâṣaṇḍi*, or group of socio-religious heretics and dissenters, e. g., Buddhists, Jainas and other denominations; and *gaṇa* (town) was the fourth.
c9.s1.t2.2
¹ II, 192.
c9.s1.t2.3
The use of *samûha* as a "genus" is to be noticed in Mitra Miśra's *Vîra-mitrodaya*,² a commentary on Yâjnavalkya. For according to him the *pûga* is a particular class of *samûha*. It was made up of those who "lived at the same place", but belonged to different social orders, the so-called castes, and followed different professions. It was thus a territorial concept, the term for a village or town, having the same connotation as in the grammar of Pâṇiṇi. In Vijnâneśvara,³ also, another commentator of Yâjnavalkya, *samûha* is generic, for he defines *gaṇa* to be a division of *samûha* and considers *grâma* (village) and other settled areas as belonging to this species. The same use of *samûha* is to be seen in Kâtyâyana,⁴ a jurist cited by Mitra Miśra.
c9.s1.t2.4
² Majumdar, 17, 58; Mookerji's *Local*, 31.
c9.s1.t2.5
³ Majumdar, 17, 58; Mookerji's *Local*, 31.
c9.s1.t2.6
⁴ Majumdar, 17, 58; Mookerji's *Local*, 31.
c9.s1.t2.7
The milieu that produced the *dharma* or *smriti śâstras* (law-books) was therefore one in which at least four or five institutions, the *śreṇî*, the *naigama*, the *pâṣaṇḍi*, the *gaṇa* or the *pûga* were centres of public life.¹ The common name for all of these bodies was *samûha*.
c9.s1.t2.8
¹ Jolly's *Recht*, p. 136.
Linked texts (1)
- Yājñavalkyasmṛti — Yājñavalkya, Sanskrit