Indian Antiquary Vol 06

SR No.: 032498
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Jas Burgess
Publisher: Swati Publications
Publication Year: 1984
Total Pages: 458
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 21 MB

Page 177

MAY, 1877.]
THE FRAGMENTS OF THE INDIKA OF MEGASTHENÉS.
131
BOOK II. FRAGM. XXV.
time,--so destructive are the heavy rains which Strab. XV. i. 35. 36, p. 702.
pour down, and the rivers also when they overOf the city Pataliputra.
flow their banks and inundate the plains, -whilo According to Megasthenôs the mean breadth
those cities which stand on commanding situa(of the Ganges) is 100 stadia, and its least depth
tions and lofty eminences are built of brick and 20 fathoms. At the meeting of this river and
mud; that the greatest city in India is that another is situated Palibothra, a city eighty stadia which is called Palim bothra, in the domiin length and fifteen in breadth. It is of the shape nions of the Prasians, where the streams of of a parallelogram, and is girded with a wooden the Eranno boas and the Ganges unite, - wall, pierced with loopholes for the dis- the Ganges being the greatest of all rivers, and charge of arrows. It has a ditch in front for
the Erannoboas being perhaps the third largest detence and for receiving the sewage of the city of Indian rivers, though greater than the greatThe people in whose country this city is situated est rivers elsewhere; but it is smaller than the is the most distinguished in all India, and is called
Ganges where it falls into it. Megasthenes the Prasii. The king, in addition to his family informs us that this city stretched in the inname, must adopt the surname of Palibothros,
habited quarters to an extremo length on each as Sandrakottos, for instance, did, to whom
side of eighty stadia, and that its breadth way · Megasthenes was sent on an embassy. [This
fifteen stadia, and that a ditch encompassed it custom also prevails among the Parthians, for
all round, which was six hundred foet in breadth all are called Arakai, though each has his own
and thirty cubits in depth, and that the wall peculiar name, as Orodês, Phraates, or some
was crownod with 570 towers and had four-andother.]
sixty gates. The same writer tells us further Then follow these words :
this remarkable fact about India, that all the All the country beyond the Hupanis is allowed to be very fertile, but little is accurately known regarding it. Partly
Indians are free, and not one of them is a slave. frora ignorance and the remoteness of its situation, every- The Lake dæmonians and the Indians are thing about it is exaggerated or represented a marvellous :
here so far in agreement. The Lakedæmonians, for instance, there are the stories of the gold digging ante, of animals and men of peculiar shapes, and possessing
however, hold the Helots as slaves, and these wonderful faculties; as the Sères, who, they say, are so Helota do servile labour ; but the Indians do long-lived that they attain an age beyond that of two not even use aliens as slaves, and much less a hundred years. They mention also an aristocratical form of government consisting of five thousand councillors, each
countryman of their own. of whom furnishes the state with an elephant.
Fragm. XXVII. According to Megasthenes the largest tigers
Strab. XV. i. 53-56, pp. 709.10. are found in the country of the Prasii, &c. (Cf.
Of the Manners of the Indians. Fragm. XII.)
The Indians all live frugally, especially when FRAGM. XXVI.
in camp. They dislike a great undisciplined Arr. Ind. 10.
multitudo, and consequently they observo good Of Pataliputra and the Manners of the Indians. order. Theft is of very rare occurrence. Ne
It is farther said that the Indians do not gasthends says that those who were in the rear monuments to the dead, but consider the camp of Sandrakottos, wherein lay 400,0) virtues which men have displayed in life, and men, found that the thefts reported on any one the songs in which their praises are celebrated, day did not exceed the value of two hundred sufficient to preserve their memory after death. drachmw, and this among a people who have But of their cities it is said that the number is no written laws, but are ignorant of writing, so great that it cannot be stated with precision, and must therefore in all the business of life but that such cities as are situated on the banks trust to memory. They live, nevertheless, hapof rivers or on the sea-coast are built of wood pily enough, being simple in their manners instead of brick, being meant to last only for & and frugal. They never drink wino except at Conf. Epit. 36.
(Sèrica) in Eastern Mongolia and the north-east of China, This was not the name of any particular nation, but but it has also been bought for in Eastern Turkestan, Was vaguely used to designate the inhabitants of the re-l in the Him Alayn towards the sources of the Ganges, in gion producing silk, of which ser is the namo in Chinese Assam, and even in Pegu. The name is first met with in and in Japanese. Tue general opinion places this region Ktesias.