World Leaders Biography

I am afraid my letters are getting a little complicated! But the life we see around us is itself very complicated. In the old days it was much simpler, but we are now considering the time when complications first began. If we follow up our inquiry slowly, and try to understand the changes in life and society as they came in, we shall find it easier to understand many things today. And if we do not try to do so, we shall never be able to understand all that is happening around us. We shall be like children lost in a dark forest. It is for this reason that I am trying to take you right back to the edge of the forest so that we may be able to find a way through it. You will remember that you asked me in Mussoorie about kings, and what they were, and why they became kings. We are now going to have a little peep in those far-off days when kings began. They were not called kings to begin with. But if we try to find out something about them, we shall know the origin of kings. I have...

In my last letter, I told you something about the division of labour. Right at the beginning, when men used to live by hunting only, there was very little division of work. Everybody hunted and they could, with difficulty, get enough to eat. The division of work or labour must have begun between men and women- the men hunting and the women staying at home and looking after the children and domestic animals. When people learnt about agriculture, many new developments took place. There was, firstly, a greater division of labour. Some people hunted, others looked after the fields and ploughed. Then again, as the time went on, people learnt new trades and specialized in them. Another interesting result of tilling land was that men began to settle down in villages and towns. Before agriculture came, people used to wander about and hunt. It was not necessary for them to live in one place. They could hunt wherever they went. And often they had to move about from place to place beca...