S2 On the Swayamvara of the Ancient Hindus. [No. 1. 



has, to a certain extent, familiarised the English reader with the cus- 

 tom by his spirited translation of the scene in Nala, where Dama- 

 yanti, the princess of Vidarbha (Berar), chooses the prince of Nisha- 

 dha from the assembly of mingled gods and men. 



" On the gods an instant gazed she — then upon the king of men ; 



And of right king Bhima's daughter named Nishadha's king her lord. 



Modestly the large -eyed maiden lifted up his garment's hem, 



Hound his shoulders threw she lightly the bright zone of radiant flowers." 



The Swayamvara of the sister of king Bhoja forms one of the most 

 beautiful episodes in the Raghuvans'a, of which we may ere long 

 hope for an English translation from Professor Griffith, already so 

 favourably known as the translator of the Kumdra Sambhava, or 

 " the birth of the Wargod." Similar scenes occur in almost every 

 Hindu poem ; in fact a Swayamvara is nearly as much an established 

 ingredient in Sanskrit epics, as a catalogue of ships or heroes 

 is in those of the west. We need only mention here those in 

 the Naishadha and the Mahabharata ; in the latter, besides that of 

 Nala, translated by Dean Milman, we have that of Draupadi, trans- 

 lated by Professor "Wilson. Nay, the rite was so popular with the 

 poets that it is even made current in the life of the gods ; and the 

 Swayamvara of Lakshmi forms the subject of the drama, which 

 Ur^asi is acting before Indra with her sister nymphs, when she 

 loses her presence of mind and lets a mortal's name escape from her 

 lips. 



In the following pages, I have collected from classical writers 

 some of the more remarkable instances of the prevalence of this 

 custom in other parts of the ancient world as well as India ; we 

 shall find traces of its presence in widely different climates, Greece, 

 Gaul and ancient Persia ; and in the last case, it may- lead to an 

 important and, I believe, hitherto unnoticed corroboration, from 

 a Greek author, of one of the fine old traditions in Pirdausi's 

 Shahnameh. 



The first instance is one which the classical student will easily 

 recall in the 6th book of Herodotus, where he discusses the rise of 

 the family of the Alcmaionidae, and its great increase of wealth and 

 power by the marriage of Megacles with the daughter of Cleisthenes-, 

 the tyrant of Sicyon. This marriage is described as a true Sway- 



