Administrative System of the Marathas c21.s3.38

c21.s3.38

Shivaji could not countenance the introduction of women into the camp on any account, and he had made it a capital offence. But in the Peshwa days not only the feudal chiefs but even the ordinary horsemen were accompanied by their womenfolk and dancing girls, jugglers and fakirs all flocked to the Maratha camp as a good place of business. Lt. Moor writes, "The number of women with this army (Parsharam Bhau Patwardhan's) could they be at all accurately computed, would not be believed; our estimate so far exceeds the bounds of probability, at least strangers would deem it so, that we are afraid to give it." ³² In the market place or camp bazar not only necessaries of life but commodities of all descriptions found customers. "Raghoba's encampment" Forbes informs us, "covered a space of many square miles; the bazar or market place, belonging to his own division, and to the principal generals, contained many thousand tents, where every trade and profession was carried on with as much regularity as in a city. Goldsmiths, jewellers, bankers, drapers, druggists, confectioners, carpenters, tailors, tent-makers, corn-grinders, and farriers, found employments; as did whole rows of silver, iron, and copper smiths;³³ the bazar did not lack wine-stalls as we learn from Broughton, and votaries of Comus had no grievance. It is needless to say that the non-combatants in a Maratha army far exceeded the combatants.