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into Palimbothra. On the other hand, the Greeks and kingsof Grecian dynasties appear in the rock inscriptions underIndian forms. 1
Megasthenes has left a lifelike picture of the Indian people. The India Notwithstanding some striking errors, the observations which °j[ e ^F as "he jotted down at Patna , three hundred years before Christ, 300 b.c.give as accurate an account of the social organization in theGangetic valley as any which existed when the Bengal AsiaticSociety commenced its labours at the end of the last century(1784). Up to the time of Megasthenes , the Greek idea ofIndia was a very vague one. Their historians had spoken oftwo classes of Indians,—certain mountainous tribes who dweltin Northern Afghanistan under the Caucasus or Hindu Kush ,and a maritime race living on the coast of Baluchistan . Ofthe India of modern geography lying beyond the Indus , theypractically knew nothing. It was this India to the east of theIndus which Megasthenes opened up to the Western world.
He describes the classification of the people, dividing them, His sevenhowever, into seven castes instead of four, 2 —namely, philo-sophers, husbandmen, shepherds, artisans, soldiers, inspectors, people,and the counsellors of the king. The philosophers were theBrahmans, and the prescribed stages of their life are indicated.Megasthenes draws a distinction between the Brahmans(Bpaxp.Sves) and the Sarmanai ('fa.p/j.dvai), from which somescholars infer that the Buddhist Sramanas or monks were arecognised order 300 b.c., or fifty years before the Council ofAsoka. But the Sarmanai might also include Brahmans inthe first and third stages of their life as students and forestrecluses. 3 The inspectors, 4 or sixth class of Megasthenes , havebeen identified with the Buddhist supervisors of morals, after-wards referred to in the sixth edict of Asoka. Arrian ’s namefor them, eVto-xoTrot, is the Greek word which has become ourmodern Bishop, or overseer of souls.
1 The Greeks as Yonas (Yavanas), from the ’la»n; or Ionians. In theInscriptions of Asoka, five Greek princes appear : Antiochus (of Syria ) ;
Ptolemy (Philadelphos of Egypt); Antigonos (Gonatos of Macedon) ;
Magas (of ICyrene); Alexander (n. of Epirus).—Weber, Hist. Ind. Lit.pp. 179, 252. But see also Wilson, Journ. Roy. As. Soc. vol. xii. (1850);and Cunningham’s Corpus Inscrip. Indie, pp. 125, 126.
- Ancient India as described by Megasthenes and Arrian , beingfragtnentsof the Indiha , by J. W. M'Crindle, M.A., p. 40, ed. 1877.
3 Brahmacharins and Vanaprasthas (Ixi&ioi). Weber very properlydeclines to identify the 2 *ppmcu exclusively with the Buddhist Sramanas.
— Hist. Ind. Lit. p. 28, ed. 1878.