Carl Clausewitz - The Strategy of Warfare – Boxed Set

In those canals, there shall be collected stones, spades (kuddála), axes (kuthári), varieties of staffs, cudgel (musrinthi), hammers (mudgara), clubs, discus, machines (yantra), and such weapons as can destroy a hundred persons at once (sataghni), together with spears, tridents, bamboo-sticks with pointed edges made of iron, camel-necks, explosives (agnisamyógas), and whatever else can be devised and formed from available materials.

[Thus ends Chapter III, "Construction of Forts,” in Book II, “The Duties of Government Superintendents” of the Arthasástra of Kautilya. End of twenty-fourth chapter from the beginning.]

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DEMARCATION of the ground inside the fort shall be made first by opening three royal roads from west to east and three from south to north.

The fort shall contain twelve gates, provided with both a land and water-way kept secret.

Chariot-roads, royal roads, and roads leading to drónamukha, stháníya, country parts, and pasture grounds shall each be four dandas (24 ft.) in width.

Roads leading to sayóníya (?), military stations (vyúha), burial or cremation grounds, and to villages shall be eight dandas in width.

Roads to gardens, groves, and forests shall be four dandas.

Roads leading to elephant forests shall be two dandas.

Roads for chariots shall be five aratnis (7½ ft.). Roads for cattle shall measure four aratnis; and roads for minor quadrupeds and men two aratnis.

Royal buildings shall be constructed on strong grounds.

In the midst of the houses of the people of all the four castes and to the north from the centre of the ground inside the fort, the king’s palace, facing either the north or the east shall, as described elsewhere (Chapter XX, Book I), be constructed occupying one-ninth of the whole site inside the fort.

Royal teachers, priests, sacrificial place, water-reservoir and ministers shall occupy sites east by north to the palace.

Royal kitchen, elephant stables, and the store-house shall be situated on sites east by south.

On the eastern side, merchants trading in scents, garlands, grains, and liquids, together with expert artisans and the people of Kshatriya caste shall have their habitations.

The treasury, the accountant’s office, and various manufactories (karmanishadyáscha) shall be situated on sites south by east.

The store-house of forest produce and the arsenal shall be constructed on sites south by west.

To the south, the superintendents of the city, of commerce, of manufactories, and of the army as well as those who trade in cooked rice, liquor, and flesh, besides prostitutes, musicians, and the people of Vaisya caste shall live.

To the west by south, stables of asses, camels, and working house.

To the west by north, stables of conveyances and chariots.

To the west, artisans manufacturing worsted threads, cotton threads, bamboo-mats, skins, armours, weapons, and gloves as well as the people of Súdra caste shall have their dwellings.

To the north by west, shops and hospitals.

To the north by east, the treasury and the stables of cows and horses.

To the north, the royal tutelary deity of the city, ironsmiths, artisans working on precious stones, as well as Bráhmans shall reside.

In the several corners, guilds and corporations of workmen shall reside.

In the centre of the city, the apartments of Gods such as Aparájita, Apratihata, Jayanta, Vaijayanta, Siva, Vaisravana, Asvina (divine physicians), and the honourable liquor-house (Srí-madiragriham), shall be situated.

In the corners, the guardian deities of the ground shall be appropriately set up.

Likewise the principal gates such as Bráhma, Aindra, Yámya, and Sainápatya shall be constructed; and at a distance of 100 bows (dhanus = 108 angulas) from the ditch (on the counterscarp side), places of worship and pilgrimage, groves and buildings shall be constructed.

Guardian deities of all quarters shall also be set up in quarters appropriate to them.

Either to the north or the east, burial or cremation grounds shall be situated; but that of the people of the highest caste shall be to the south (of the city).

Violation of this rule shall be punished with the first amercement.

Heretics and Chandálas shall live beyond the burial grounds.

Families of workmen may in any other way be provided with sites befitting with their occupation and field work. Besides working in flower-gardens, fruit-gardens, vegetable-gardens, and paddy-fields allotted to them, they (families) shall collect grains and merchandise in abundance as authorised.

There shall be a water-well for every ten houses.

Oils, grains, sugar, salt, medicinal articles, dry or fresh vegetables, meadow grass, dried flesh, haystock, firewood, metals, skins, charcoal, tendons (snáyu), poison, horns, bamboo, fibrous garments, strong timber, weapons, armour, and stones shall also be stored (in the fort) in such quantities as can be enjoyed for years together without feeling any want. Of such collection, old things shall be replaced by new ones when received.

Elephants, cavalry, chariots, and infantry shall each be officered with many chiefs inasmuch as chiefs, when many, are under the fear of betrayal from each other and scarcely liable to the insinuations and intrigues of an enemy.

The same rule shall hold good with the appointment of boundary, guards, and repairers of fortifications.

Never shall báhirikas who are dangerous to the well being of cities and countries be kept in forts. They may either be thrown in country parts or compelled to pay taxes.

[Thus ends Chapter IV, “ Buildings within the Fort” in Book II, “The Duties of the Government Superintendents” of the Arthasástra of Kautilya. End of twenty-fifth chapter from the beginning.]

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THE Chamberlain (sannidhátá = one who ever attends upon the king) shall see to the construction of the treasury-house, trading-house, the store-house of grains, the store-house of forest produce, the armoury and the jail.

Having dug up a square well not too deep to be moist with water, having paved both the bottom and the sides with slabs of stone, he shall, by using strong timber, construct in that well a cage-like under-ground chamber of three stories high, the top-most being on a level with the surface of the ground, with many compartments of various design, with floor plastered with small stones, with one door, with a movable staircase, and solemnised with the presence of the guardian deity.

Above this chamber, the treasury house closed on both sides, with projecting roofs and extensively opening into the store-house shall be built of bricks.

He may employ outcast men (abhityakta-purusha) to build at the extreme boundary of the kingdom a palacious mansion to hold substantial treasure against dangers and calamities.

The trading-house shall be a quadrangle enclosed by four buildings with one door, with pillars built of burnt bricks, with many compartments, and with a row of pillars on both sides kept apart.

The store-house shall consist of many spacious rooms and enclose within itself the store-house of forest produce separated from it by means of wall and connected with both the underground chamber and the armoury.

The court (dharmasthíya) and the office of the ministers (mahámátríya) shall be built in a separate locality.

Provided with separate accommodation for men and women kept apart and with many compartments well guarded, a jail shall also be constructed.

All these buildings shall be provided with halls (sála) pits (kháta—privy [?]), water-well, bath-room, remedies against fire and poison, with cats, mangooses, and with necessary means to worship the guardian gods appropriate to each.