Situating Kingship within an Embryonic Frame of Masculinity in Early India

Kingship in early India has been a much discussed issue both within the early shastric literature and within modern scholarship. It has often got intertwined with the concept of the origin of the state, and numerous theories including brahmanical and Buddhist have been advanced to suggest the rationale for evolution and sustenance of kingship/monarchy over time and space. For instance, the first faint references of the contract theory of the origin of the state are to be found in the Brahmanas, which refer to the origin of kingship through election among gods on account of the compelling necessity of carrying on successful war against the asuras. In one of the Brahmanas this idea is further developed in connection with the great coronation ceremony of Indra. It is stated that headed by Prajapati, the gods said to one another that amongst them Indra was the ‘most vigorous, the most strong, the most perfect, the best in carrying out any work’. So they decide to instal him in kingship and accordingly to perform his mahabhishek, in which he was consecrated for different forms of royality.