India as Described by Megasthenes and Arrian: WebGuruCool Indological Studies 6(1)

From times immemorial, India, as a country, has been of great interest to the world owing to its dynamic culture and vast diversity. This has attracted many travelers and historians to India who either visited it or read extensively about it with the help of sources available to them. Of all these, Greek writers and historians visited India extensively, especially from the times of Alexander and left detailed accounts about the country. These accounts are known as classical accounts which are an important source to study the history of ancient India, undoubtedly from the perspectives of the foreigners.

Megasthenes and Arrian were such two writers who had left detailed account of contemporary India. Their accounts discuss and describe various aspects of the country like its myths and legends, its geography and agriculture, its wildlife and landscape, its administration, its society and most importantly the people who formed the Indian society. These descriptions have been dealt with in detail under two sections for the descriptions or accounts left by Megasthenes and Arrian respectively.

Although these accounts are vivid and describe India in detail, yet they need to be carefully assessed at times, sometimes by comparative studies or general logic, since these were left by foreign writers who often did not used to have a clear idea about the foreign land with which they were interacting. Therefore, if and when possible and necessary, the same has been done in this work as well.