152 Part III: South Asia
of specialization and stratification, the king gathered around him a full-time
warrior class; priests who functioned as advisors, diviners, and intercessors
with the gods; and a nobility composed of the king’s family and lineage that
grew larger and more powerful by the generation. All these people had to be
supported by the agricultural classes. Independent cultivators were turned into
peasants, tied to the land by various devices that squeezed them for surpluses
to support the growing nonproductive elite. A percentage of the harvest, often
25 percent or more, was demanded, which forced peasants to work harder and
find ways to grow more, because their own subsistence needs remained the
same. Political coercion squeezed out an extra portion of grain to be passed
upward as taxation.
In the meantime, urban densities formed around the king’s court and in a
few trade centers, so that along with villages there was a hierarchy of urban
spaces: towns and one or two major cities that were trade or court centers. In
the earliest cities, 10,000 was a lot of people; by 2500 B.C.E., there were cities
with populations close to 50,000. Cultural and intellectual life began to diverge
from village culture in the courts of early kings. Specialists of all sorts elabo-
rated their own cultural domains: a few carpenters turned into architects and
engineers, building palaces, temples, and mausoleums for their royal patrons.Box 5.1 Characteristics of CivilizationsPrimary Features
•The State:
— Centralized authority in a monarch, king, emperor, or oligarchy
— Stratification of society with an aristocracy, priesthood, military, and peasants
— A tax/tribute system for redistribution of surpluses upward
— High population densities- Expanded food production to support economically unproductive classes
- Urbanization: villages, towns, and a few true urban centers with populations of
7,000–10,000 - Full-time craft specialists
Secondary Features - Monumental art and architecture
- Long-distance trade
•Codified law
•Writing systems - Mathematics and astronomy
- Religion in the service of the state
- Bifurcation of folk culture and court culture, with court-sponsored arts and intel-
lectual traditions