In the form of a series of short sentences
they codify and systematise the various branches of knowledge sacred and
secular.
they codify and systematise the various branches of knowledge sacred and
secular.
Cambridge History of India - v1
; VI, 268 f.
; VI, 328 ; cf.
Dhp.
Comm.
III, 66.
17 Jāt. I, 423 ; III, 446 : Dialogues I, 7, n. 4,
18 Market' and 'market-place' are frequently used by translators, but rather
inſei entially than as literal renderings.
## p. 193 (#227) ############################################
VIII ]
MEANS OF EXCHANGE
193
>
a
was hampered by slow transport, by individualistic production, and by
primitive machinery. But it was left free for the producer and dealer to
prevail by competition', and also by adulteration', and to bring about an
equation with a demand which was largely compact of customary usage and
relatively unaffected by the swifter fluctuations termed fashion.
Instances of price-haggling are not rare, and we have already noticed
the dealer's sense of the wear and tear of it, and a case of that more
developed competition which we know as 'dealing in futures. The outlay
in this case, for a carriage, a pavilion at the Benares docks, men (purisā),
and ushers (pātihārā), must have cut deep into his last profit of 1,000 coins,
but he was 20,000 per cent, to the good as the result of it! After this the
profit of 200 and 400 per cent. reaped by other traders falls a little flat, and
such economic thrills only revive when we consider the well-known story of
the fancy price obtained by Prince Jeta for his grove near Sāvatthi
from the pious merchant Anāthapiņdiika, limited only by the number of
coins (metal uncertain) required to cover the soil? .
At the same time custom may very well have settled price to a great
extent. “My wife is sometimes as meek as a 100-price slavegirl® reveals a
customary price. For the royal household, at least, prices were fixed
without appeal by th3 court valuer (agghakāraka) who stood between the
two fires of offending the king if he valued the goods submitted at their
full cost, or price as demanded, and of driving away tradesmen if he refused
bribes and cheapened the ware3º. On the other hand the king might
disgust him by too niggardly a bonuso. It may also have been the duty
of this official to assess the duty of one-twentieth on each consignment of
native merchandise imported into a city, and of one-tenth, plus a sample,
on each foreign import, as stated in the law-books of Manull, Gautama12,
and Baudhayānal3. Such octrois are alluded to in one Jātaka, where the
king remits to a subject the duty collected at the gates of his capital14.
Finally, it may have been his to assess merchants for their specific com-
mutation of the rājakāriya, namely, one article sold per month to the king
at a discount (arghāpacayena15).
The 'sample' mentioned above is suggestive of a surviving payment
made in kind. That the ancient systems of barter and of reckoning values
by cows or by rice-measures had for the most part been replaced by the use
1 Cf. Jät. III, 282 f.
3 Cf, 1b, 220.
3 Ib. I, 111 f. , 195 ; II, 222, 289, 424 f.
4 16. I, 99.
5 Ib. I, 121 f.
6 Ib. I, 109; cf. IV, 2.
7 Vin. II, 158 f. (Cull. V. VI, 4, 9) ; Jāi. I, 92.
8 Jåt. I, 299.
9 Jät. I, 124 f. ; II, 31 ; Pss. of Brethren 25, 212. 10 16. IV, 138.
11 VIII, 393-400; cf. Jät. IV, 132.
12 X, 26.
13 J, X, 18, vv. 14, 15.
14 Jāt. VI, 347.
15 Gaut. X, 35.
## p. 194 (#228) ############################################
194
[ch.
ECONOMIC CONDITIONS
a
a
of a metal currency, carrying well understood and generally accepted
exchange value, is attested by the earliest Buddhist literature. Barter
emerges in certain contingencies', as e. g. when a wanderer obtains a
meal from a woodlander for a gold pinº, or when among humble folk
a dog is bought for a kahāpaņa (kārshāpaņı) plus a cloak? . Barter was
also permitted in special commodities by the law-books ascribed to
Gautamat and Vasishtha’ and was prescribed in certain cases for the
Sangha“, to whom the use of money was forbidden'. Moreover, as
standard of value, it is possible that rice was still used when the Jātaka-
book was compiled.
But for the ordinary mechanism of exchange we find, in that and all
early Buddhist literature, the worth of every marketable commodity,
that of a dead mouse and a day at the festival up to all kinds of prices, fees,
pensions, fines, loans, stored treasure, and income, stated in figures of a
certain coin, or its fractions. This is either stated, or implied to be, the
kahapāņa. Of the coins called purāņas this literature knows nothing Other
current instruments of exchange are the ancient nikkha (nishka – a gold coin,
originally a gold ornament)0, the suvanna, also of gold, and such bronze or
copper tokens as the kamsa, the pāda, the māsaka (māsha), and the
kākānikā. Cowry shells (sippikāni) are once mentioned', but only as we
should speak of doits or mites, not as anything still having currenoy.
That there was instability as to the relative value of standard or token
coins in place and time we learn from the Vinaya : ‘At that time (of Bimbi-
sara or Ajātasattu), at Rājagaha, five māsakas were equal to one pada 12.
Again, the nikkha was valued now at five 13, now at four suvannas14.
Of substitutes for money, such as instruments of credit, we read of
signet rings used as deposit or securityls, of wife or children pledged or sold
for debt16, and of IOU's or debt-sheets (inapannāni)". The bankrupt who, in,
the Jātaka tale, invites his creditors to bring their debt-sheets for settlement,
only to drown himself before their eyesls, appears in a Milinda simile antici-
pating the crisis by making a public statement of his liabilities and assetslthe
entanglement and anxieties of debt as well as the corporate liability belonging
to communistic life in a religious order rendered it necessary to debar any
1
1
1 There seems to be nothing in the text of Jātaka I, 251(Vāruņi Ját. ) to justify the
translator's inference that barter was normal; see J. R. A. S. , 1901, p. 876.
2 Jāt VI, 519.
3 Ib II, 247
4 VII, 16 f.
5 II, 37 f.
6 l'in. II, 174 (Cull. V. VI. 19).
7 l'in. III, 237; II, 294 ff. (Cull. V. XII, I ff. ).
8 Ját. I, 124 f.
9 For details of prices see Mrs. Rhys Davids, J. R. A. S. , 1901, pr. 882 f.
lo Zimmer, Altindisches Leben, 259.
11 Jāt. 1, 425 f. 12 l'in. III, 45. 13 Childers, Poli Dictionary, s. v. nikkho.
14 Manu, VIII, 137. For a more detailed discussion see J. R. A. S. , 1901, p. 877 ff.
15 Jāt. I, 121. 16 16. VI, 521; Therig. 444.
17 Jāt I, 230 ; ef. 227, panne äropetvä.
18 16. IV, 256.
19 Mil. 131 (text); cf. 279.
-----------
## p. 195 (#229) ############################################
VIII ]
GENERAL CONCLUSIONS
195
a
candidate from admission to the Sangha who was a debtor! . And the sight
of a deposited security recalling the past circumstances of the pledging is
instanced in the Milinda as case of the physical process of recollection
(rati)
No definite rates of interest on money loans appear in the early books.
But the term which appears in the law-books as 'usury' (vrddhi, Pāli vaddhi)
is found. Meaning literally profit or increase, it may very early have acquired
the more specialised import. There is a tolerant tone concerning the money-
lender in a Jātaka tale, where a patron, in enabling a huntsman to better
himself, names money-lending (iņa-dāna), together with tillage, trade,
and harvesting as four honest callings? Gautama is equally tolerant*.
But the general tendency of this profession to evade any legal or customary
rate of interest and become the type of profit-mongering finds condemnation
in other law-books. Hypocritical ascetics are accused of practising itº. No
one but the money-lender seems to have lent capital wealth for interest as
an investment. For instance, only bonds (paņņā) are spoken of in the case
of the generous Anāthapiņdika's 'bad debts'? . Capital wealth was hoarded,
either in the house—in large mansions over the entrance passage (dvāra.
kotịhaka)—under the ground', in brazen jars under the river bank, 10 or
deposited with a friendll. The nature and amount of the wealth thus
hoarded was registered on gold or copper plates12.
Fragmentary as are the collected scraps of evidence on which the
foregoing outlines of social economy have been constructed, more might
yet be inferred did space permit. It shɔuld, however, be fairly clear from
what has been said, that if, during, say, the seventh to the fourth century
B. C. it had been the vogue, in India, to write treatises on economic
institutions, there might have come down to us the record both of
conventions and of theories as orderly and as relatively acceptable to the
peoples as anything of the kind in, say, the latter middle ages was to
the peoples of Western Europe. But it is a curious fact that often where
the historian finds little material to hand wherewith to rebuild, he judges
that there never were any buildings. Thus in a leading historical work on
economics, revised and enlarged in 1890, the whole subject of the economic
ideas of the ‘Orient' is dismissed in a single page as being reducible to a few
ethical precepts, and as extolling agriculture and decrying arts and com-
merce ; further, that division of labour, though politically free, stiffened
>
2
p. 80.
>
1 Vin. I, 76 (Mah. I, 46) ; cf. D. I, 71 f.
3 Jät. IV, 422 4 X, 6 ; XI, 21.
5 Vas. II, 41, 42 ; Baudh. I, 5, 1023. 5 ; Manu, IIT, 153, 189 ; VIII, 152, 153.
6 åt. IV, 181.
7 Jāt. I, 227.
8 1b 1, 351 ; II, 431.
9 1b. I, 225, 375 f. , 424 ; II, 308 ; III, 24, 116
10 1b. I, 227, 323.
11 16. VI, 521.
12 16. IV, 7, 488 ; VI, 29 ; cf. IV, 237.
## p. 196 (#230) ############################################
196
[CH.
ECONOMIC CONDITIONS
1
into a system of hereditary caste, arresting economic progress, and that the
Chinese alone, and only from the seventh century A. D. , had any insight into
the nature of money and its fiduciary substitutes. But we have been
looking behind the ethical precepts of the preacher, and the sectarian
scruples of a class, at the life of the peoples of North India, as it survives
in the records of their folk-lore, and of the discipline of the brethren
in orders who lived in close touch with all classes. And we have seen
agriculture diligently and amicably carried on by practically the whole
people as a toilsome but most natural and necessary pursuit. We have seen
crafts and commerce flourishing, highly organised corporately and locally,
under conditions of individual and corporate competition, the leading
men thereof the friends and counsellors of kings. We have found ‘labour'
largely hereditary, yet, therewithal, a mobility and initiative anything
but rigid revealed in the exercise of it. And we have discovered a thorough
familiarity with money and credit ages before the ‘seventh century A. D. '
1 L. Cossa, Introduction to Political Economy.
## p. 197 (#231) ############################################
CHAPTER IX
THE PERIOD OF THE SŪTRAS, EPICS, AND LAW-BOOKS
a
The later Brāhman literature which, whatever may be the age of
its representative works in their present from, undoubtedly had its roots
in a period at least as early as the rise of Jainism and Buddhism, may
be classified under the four headings-Sūtras, Epic poems, Law-books,
and Purāņas. These belong to two distinct species of literary composition,
the Sūtras being broadly distinguished from the others both in from
and object.
The purpose of the Sūtras, so called from the word sūtra which means
'a thread,' is to afford a clue through the mazes of Brāhmanical learning
contained in the Brāhmaṇas.
In the form of a series of short sentences
they codify and systematise the various branches of knowledge sacred and
secular. They are intended to satisfy the needs of a system of oral
instruction, so that each step in the exposition of a subject may be learnt
progressively and a convenient analysis of the whole committed to memory
by the student. The earliest Sūtras are in the priestly language and
represent a phase which is transitional between the language of the
Brāhmaṇas and Classical Sanskrit as fixed by the grammarians.
The Epics supply the model both for language and form which
is followed by the Law-books and the Purāņas. Their source is to be traced
to the traditional recitations of bards who were neither priests nor scholars.
Their language is thus naturally more popular in character and less
regular than Classical Sanskrit. In many respects it does not conform to
the laws laid down by the grammarians, and is ignored by them. This
became the conventional language of epic poetry, which was used also
in the Law-books, the subject matter of which was taken to a great extent
from the Sūtras, and in the Purāņas, which, as they stand at present, belong
to a period not earlier than the fourth century a. d. The metres of the Law.
books and the Purāņas are also substantially those of the Epic poems.
1 Wackernagel, Altind. Gram. vol. I, p. xiv.
197
## p. 198 (#232) ############################################
1. 98
[ CA.
THE PERIOD OF SŪTRAS, EPICS, ETC.
The period of the Sūtras, Epics, and Law-books thus overlaps that
of Buddhist India on the one hand, and reaches well into the period of the
extant Purāṇas on the other. The earliest known Purāņa precedes the
later law-books probably by centuries, as the Sūtras precede the earliest
works of Buddhism. Nevertheless it is not only new matter which is
offered by the literature, whether legal or epic, but virtually a new phase,
a fresh point of view, the life of India as it shows itself under the dominion
of the Brāhmans, who have been the real masters of Indian thought for
more than three millenniums. It is in fact the continuation under new con-
ditions of the history depicted above, before Jain and Buddhist had arisen.
As we read the works of these important sects we receive the im-
pression that the world of India was one in which the ancient priestly caste
had lost its authority ; that nobles and wealthy merchants were more
regarded than Brāhmans. But it must be remembered that, despite the
wide reach of Buddhism when in its full power, it influenced at first only
that part of the country where it arose, and that the earlier writings depict-
ing the life and teaching of Buddha represent chiefly the circumstances
found in a very circumscribed area, in fact just the area where Brāhmanism
was weakest. The elements of social life were the same here as elsewhere,
but they were not arranged in the same way. The stronghold of Brahmanism
lay to the West, and there the priest had had his say and built up his power
among clans boasting direct descent from Vedic heroes and more inclined
to bow to the mysterious Vedic word of which the only custodian was the
Brāhman priest. In short, as Brāhmanism exaggerates the power of the
priest, so Buddhism belittles it unduly, not because it sets out to do so but
because each represents a special point of view based more or less upon
gecgraphical position. Owing, however, to a still later interpretation of
caste, our modern ideas on the subject are apt to be peculiarly confused.
To understand the social order into which we enter as we begin the study of
the Sūtras, epics, and law-books, we must renounce altogether the notion of
caste in its strict modern sense, as on the other hand we must free ourselves
from the thought that the whole caste-system is merely a priestly hypothesis
disproved by the conditions revealed in Buddhistic writings.
In point of fact, even the Buddhist writings recognise the formal
castes ; and it is simply impossible that a social structure widely pervading
as that of the so-called castes, a structure revealed not by didactic works
alone but implicitly as well as explicitly presented to us in every body of
writings whether orthodox or heterodox, should have been made out of
whole cloth. What we loosely call by this name to-day are later refine-
ments ; and we do, not need to turn to Buddhist works to show that in
ancient times the castes were merely orders socially distinct but not very
strictly seperated or ramified into such sub-divisional castes as obtain at
the present time.
1
## p. 199 (#233) ############################################
IX]
OUTLINES OF CHRONOLOGY
199
Yet before giving the proof of this in detail, it will be well to con-
sider briefly the chronology of the works to be reviewed in relation to the
general character and history of the states in which they arose. The legal
literature which begins with the Sūtras and is represented in the epics does
not really end at all, as works of this nature continue to be written down to
modern times, chiefly by eminent jurists who comment on older works.
But, after eliminating the modern jurists and confining ourselves to the
law-books which may be called classic, we still find that the terminus falls
well into the middle of the first millennium of our era ; and as the beginning
of this literature in Sūtra style reaches back at least as far as this before
the beginning of our era, the whole period is rather more than a thousand
years, about the middle of which must be set the time to which the epic
poems are to be assigned as works already known and perhaps nearly
completed
The cycle thus designated as a millennium is one of very varied
political fortunes ; and the social, political and religious material of the
legal and epical literature must necessarily be explained in accordance with
the outward changes. What these changes were is described in detail in
other chapters of this work. For our present purpose it is necessary only to
recount them in outline. At the end of the sixth century B. c. , early in
the period to which the Sūtras belong, the Persian Empire held two provin-
ces in N. W. India - Gandhāra, the present districts of Peshāwar and
Rāwalpindi, and the 'Indian' province, that is to say, the country of the
Lower Indus : and the northern part of India generally was dominated by
peoples of the Aryan race who had descended from the Punjab and spread
eastward for centuries, but not so that the recently acquired territory was
thoroughly assimilated to the cults and culture of the invaders, nor so that
any one of these invaders had established an empire. Long before the end
of this same period, Buddha, Mahāvīra, and other reformers had broken
with the cult derived from the Vedic age, and the great empire of Açoka had
made a new epoch in political life. This alteration, however, had been in-
troduced, though adventitiously, through outer rather than inner conditions.
After the short campaign in the Punjab, made by Alexander as the conquer-
or of the Persian Empire, his Indian dominions were, within few years,
absorbed by the growing power of Magadha (S. Bihār) then under the
sway of a usurper, Chandragupta (c. 321-297 B. c. ) the low-born son of
Murā and the founder of the Maurya empire. This empire extended from
Pāțaliputra (Patna) to Herāt and was maintained by an army of approxi-
mately 700,000 men, the first real empire in India. His successors,
Bindusāra and Acoka, enlarged the empire annexing Kalinga on the eastern
coast and ruling as far south as Madras. This dynasty continued in power
till the end of the Sūtra period : and under it, during the reign of Açoka
## p. 200 (#234) ############################################
200
[CH.
THE PERIOD OF SŪTRAS, EPICS, ETC.
>
>
(c. 274-236 B. c. ) Buddhism became the court-religion. Açoka's period is
determined by the mention in his edicts of certain Hellenic princes who were
his contemporaries, but after his reign there comes a period of less chrono-
logical certainty. The different versions of the Purāņas are not in agree-
ment as to the exact number of his successors; but they are unanimous in
asserting that the Maurya dynasty lasted for 137 years : that is to say, it is
supposed to have come to an end c. 184 B. C. For over a century after its
fall the Çunga dynasty, whose founder, Pushyamitra, had slain Bșihadratha
Maurya and usurped his throne, held sway, despite forcible inroads of the
Yavanas (Greeks) and the Andhras; and we learn that both Pushyamitra
and the Andhra King, Çātakarņi, performed the famous horse-sacrifice,' in
accordance with the ancient Vedic rite, thus challenging all opponents of
their authority. The son of this Pushyamitra was Agnimitra, who conquer-
ed Vidarbha, (Berār), then a province of the Andhra Empire of S. India, and
the grandson, who guarded the horse, was Vasumitra. These names, as
also the re-establishment of the ‘horse-sacrifice', are highly significant in that
they show a renascence of the Vedic religion and a consequent decline in
Buddhism. The same thing is indicated by the fact that Khåravela, a king
of Kalinga, who boasts of having invaded the Andhra dominions as well as
Northern India, was a Jain. Sumitra, the son of Agnimitra, was, according
to Bāņa's historical romance, the Harshācharita, miserably slain by
Mitradeva, who may perhaps have been a Brāhman of the Kaņva family
which eventually gained the chief power in the state. The account given
by the Purāņas states that the minister Vasudeva slew the tenth and last of
the Çunga kings and inaugurated a new dynasty, called the Kaņva dynasty,
which lasted for about half a century ; but, since the Kanvas are difinitely
styled 'servants of the Çungas' and for other reasons, it seems more probable
that the later Çunga kings had been reduced to subjection by their Brāhman
ministers, and that the lists of thesecont emporary rulers nominal and actual
were wrongly regarded by some late editor of the Purāņas as successive. It
is further related that one of the Andhra kings' slew Suçarman, the last of
the Kanvas, and thus brought Magadha under the sway of the sovereigns,
whose names and titles, as well as their sacrificial inscriptions, show them to
have been followers of the ancient Vedic religion. But here again it appears
that dynastic lists have been brought together and arranged in an unreal se-
quence. There can be little doubt that the first of the Andhra kings was ear-
lier in date than the first of the Çungas, and not 157 years later as would
appear from the Purāņas. It is indeed doubtful if the Andhras ever ruled
in Magadha : but their sway in Central and Southern India lasted until the
middle of the third century A. D. ?
1 The Purăņas say the founder of the dynasty, Simuka, but the chronological
difficulties which this statement involves seem to be unsurmountablo.
2 See Chapters XIII (the Purāņas); XVIII-XX (the Maurya Empire) ; XXI
(Indian Native States); XXIV (the earlier Andhras).
3
## p. 201 (#235) ############################################
IX]
WIDER POLITICAL OUTLOOK
201
>
In the meantime, on the decline of the Maurya empire which must
have set in soon after the death of the Emperor Açoka (c. 236 B. c. ) the
Punjab passed into the hands of foreign invaders - first, Greeks from the
kingdom of Bactria to the north, and subsequently Scythians (Çakas) and
Parthians (Pahlavas) from the kingdom of Parthia to the west. The
kingdoms established by these new-comers in the Punjab were overwhelm-
ed by still another wave of invasion from the north. The Kushāņas, a people
from the reign of China who had driven the Çakas out of Bactria, began
their Indian conquests with the overthrow of the kingdom of Kābul about
the middle of the first century A. D. , and extended their power until, in the
reign of Kanishka (probably 78 A. D. ), the patron of that branch of the
Buddhist Church which is called the Mahāyāna, the Kushāņa empire was
paramount in N. Indial.
In Western India we can to some extent trace from inscriptions and
coins the varying fortunes in the conflict between the Andhras and the in-
vaders of N. India, and the establishment in Kāthiāwār and Cutch of a
dynasty of Çaka satraps, originally no doubt feudatories of the Kushāņas,
which lasted till c. 390 A. D. when it was overthrown by the Guptas.
The period of the Gupta empire which dates from 319 A. D. is a most
important epoch in the history of Sanskrit literature. It is the golden
age of Classical Sanskrit ; and in it most of the Purāṇas and the works
belonging to the later legal literature appear to have assumed their present
form.
This brief conspectus of the conditions obtaining in India during the
time to which we have to assign the Sūtras, epics, and legal works will show
that other influences than those with which we have been dealing hitherto
are to be expected ; and these are indeed found, but not to such an extent
as might have been anticipated. These influences are indeed to be traced
rather in the general enlargement of vision of the writers than in specific
details. The simple village life with which for the most part the Sūtras
are concerned, the government of a circumscribed district by a local rāja,
are gradually exchanged for the life reflected from large towns and imperial
power. Though this is more noticeable in the epics, it may be detected in
the later Sūtras and again in the still later law-books. During this period
the power of Buddhism increased and then, reaching its culmination, began
to wane, The world of India by the second century before Christ was
already becoming indifferent to the teaching of Buddhism and was being
reabsorbed into the great permanent cults of Vishņu and Çiva, with which
in spirit Buddhism itself began to be amalgamated. The Brāhman priests
reasserted themselves ; animal sacrifices, forbidden by Açoka, were no longer
under the royal ban ; and with this open expression of the older cult the
1 For these foreign invaders of India see Chapters XXII, XXIII.
;
## p. 202 (#236) ############################################
202
(ch.
THE PERIOD OF SŪTRAS, EPICS, ETC.
whole system of Brāhmanism revived, fostered alike by the temple priests
and their ritualism and by the philosophers, who regarded Buddhism as
both a detestable heresy and a false interpretation of life.
But there is little apparent influence from outside, despite, the wider
political outlook ; and where such influence might be looked for with great-
est certainty, namely in the effect of Greek domination, it is practically nil.
Only the Yavanas, literally 'Ionians', a people or peoples of Greek descent
who may be traced in Indian literature and inscriptions from the third
century B. c. to the second century A. D. , and who were manifestly a factor of
no small importance in the political history of Northern and Western India
– they are celebrated as great fighters in the Mahābhārata and other litera-
ture- remain to show that the conquest of Alexander and the Greek
invasion from Bactria had any result. Other indications point rather to
Persia than to Hellas. Thus the title Satrap, which was continued in use
by Alexander, still remains under Çakas and Kushāṇas to testify to the long
Persian dominion in N. W. India. Apart from this, political and social
relations do not appear to be affected at all either by Hellenic or by Persian
influence. The native army remains of the same sort, though greatly
enlarged. The social theory remains practically the same, save that a place
among degraded 'outcastes' is given to Yavanas as to other barbarians.
Architecture and the arts of sculpture, gem-engraving and coinage do indeed
bear witness, especially in the N. W. region of India to the influence of
Persia and Greece during this period, just as at a later date, native astrono-
my was affected, and indeed practically superseded by the system of
Alexandria. But the period with which we are dealing at present does not
make it necessary to inquire into the relation between India and the outer
world in respect to science. The idea that Indian epic poetry itself is due
to Hellenic influence has indeed been suggested ; but as a theory this idea
depends on so nebulous a parallel of plot that it has received no support.
>
## p. 203 (#237) ############################################
CHAPTER X
FAMILY LIFE AND SOCIAL CUSTOMS AS THEY
APPEAR IN THE SŪTRAS
The general period of the Sūtras extends from the sixth or seventh
century before Christ to about the second century. It is evident that the
different Vedic schools had Sūtras which were revised, or replaced by new
Sūtras, at various periods, and that some of these extended into later
centuries than others. Thus it would be a mistake to limit all the Sūtras of
all the schools to certain centuries. The Sūtras are manuals of instruction ;
and those which are of interest historically formed but a part of a large
volume, which was intended primarily for the guidance of religious teachers
and treated mainly of the sacrifice and other religious matters. Except for
students of ceremonial details these sacrificial works (Çrauta Sūtras) are of
no interest. What concerns us at present is that portion of the whole which
goes by the name of Gộihya and Dharma Sūtras, that is, manuals of
conduct in domestic and social relations. In some cases the rules given in
these two divisions are identical; and the two divisions are treated in such a
way as to condense one division for the sake of not repeating directions
given in the other. For our purpose they may be regarded as forming one
body containing rules of life not especially connected with the performance
of the greater sacrifices. · They differ mainly as representing the views of
different schools on minute points or as products of different parts of the
country, and as earlier or later opinions. All of them claim to be based
upon Vedic teaching. Thus the Grihya and Dharma Sūtras of Āpastamba
form but a few chapters of a work called the Kalpa, of which twenty-four
a
chapters teach the proper performance of sacrifice and only two treat of the
sacred law, while one abridged chapter gives the rules for the performance
of domestic ceremonies. Again this special ‘law-book’ is not a law-book
having universal application, but is a product of a Vedic school belonging
to the Andhras in the south-east of India ; and, thirdly, it combats some of
the opinions expressed by writers on the same subject. Somewhat similar
203
## p. 204 (#238) ############################################
204
(CH.
LIFE AND CUSTOMS IN THE SUTRAS
>
conditions prevail in the case of the other Sūtras. They are, in short, local
manuals which form complete wholes only by virtue of their subject-matter,
but which, to their authors, were merely sections of a greater work, the
chief importance of which lay in the handing down of traditional
knowledge in regard to religious practices. They may be regarded, however,
as the first steps in the evolution of legal literature ; for the metrical Çāstras
or law-bocks are only the extension and completion of the rules of the
Dharma Sūtras, with a gradual increase in the part allotted to civil and
criminal law and a relaxation of the bond connecting the Sūtras with
definite Vedic sects. The Dharma Sūtras are more universal ; the Grihya ·
Sūtras reflect individual schools. But even the Gșihyas are not Çrauta
(divinely revealed), but Smärta (sacred tradition).
The content of the Grihya Sūtras as is implied by the name, is narrower
than that of the Dharma Sūtras. The first contain, however, to all students
of folk-lore a store-house of material in regard to rites and superstitions
connected with home life, such as no other body of literature in the world
presents. In the first place, the life of man is traced religiously from boy-
hood to burial. Every important phase of a man's existence is accompanied
with its appropriate rite ; and, incidentally, what to do and what not to do,
injunctions, prohibitions, taboos, are taught as general rules of conduct.
The greater events, birth, marriage, death, are described in their religious
setting, each with minute detail, so that not only are the sacred texts cited
which should be repeated on every occasion, but the physical acts to which
the texts are ancillary are described. For example, such a text must be
repeated while a dead man's bones are being collected. The one who collects
them must pick them up with such and such fingers and place them in just
such a jar. The wedding verses are indicated ; the bride must make just so
many steps and pour out grain with her hands held in just such a position,
etc. Some of the Vedic schools, instead of embracing all the Sūtras in one
work as a Kalpa Sūtra, have apparently laid so much stress on these
domestic rites that the manuals have become independent works, thus fore-
shadowing what happened later in the case of the Çāstras. The complete
work, embracing all kinds of Sūtras, as was to be expected, to the
Yajurveda schools, since the priests of this Veda were from the beginning
particularly concerned with manual exercises, in arranging the altar, etc. ,
and the details of sacrifice ; while the priests of the other Vedas had to do
more with the recitation and chanting of the sacred texts. Nevertheless, the
literature of the Rigveda also contains both Çrauta and Grihya Sūtras, as
does that of the Sāmaveda. Finally, the Atharvaveda possesses not only
a Väitāna Crauta Sūtra but a Kançika Sūtra, which is in part a Gșihya
Sūtra but contains also directions for carrying out the many magic cere-
monies connected with the text of that unique Veda.
a
## p. 205 (#239) ############################################
X].
THE GRIHYA SŪTRAS
205
case.
The preponderance of domestic ceremonies in the Gșihya Sūtra results
in Dharma, or social, matter being introduced rather adventitiously, as
when the rules concerning the choice of wives are given, whereas Grinya,
domestic, rules belong as much to the Dharma Sūtras as to the Gșihya
Sūtras themselves. The difference is that the weight in the Dharmas is
laid on the wider relation of man to the state, so that those sections which
deal with the family become condensed and subordinate. Specimens of
southern Gțihya Sutras are also not lacking. Thus as the Dharma of
Āpastamba reflects a South-Indian origin, so also the Gșihya Sūtra of
Khādira belongs to Southern India, and it is an indication that Sutra
literature extends far beyond the time of Buddha that this should be the
Such also may be surmised to be the fact (rather than that Vedic
schools were domiciled in South India at a much earlier period) from the
circumstance that the Sūtra of Khădira is a later and more concise version
of the Sūtra of Gobhila. There are other examples of this endeavour to
revise a Sūtra on lines of economy, each later writer reducing the work
of his predecessor as much as possible or convenient, conciseness being the
test of Sūtra excellence. Gobhila's work is detailed and lengthy ; Khādira's
is virtually the same work in condensed form. Everything that could be
omitted, such as explanatory digressions, smaller details of ceremonies, etc. ,
was left out, solely to make the work easier to remember. But clearness
as well as conciseness was aimed at and attained by a fresh arrangement of
the older matter.
An example of the scope and method of a Gộihya Sūtra may be taken
from the directions of Khădira regarding the little oblations to spirits and
gods required from a wedded pair. After describing the wedding ceremony,
Khādira passes directly to this question of offerings and oblations, describ-
ing first briefly the fire used for the purpose of receiving the oblation, thus :
The domestic (grihua) fire is that at which he has taken her hand (in marriage) or
that on which he has put the last piece of wood (as a student before marriage) or a(fresh)
fire twirled out (of wood), the last being pure but not tending to prosperity ; or he may
get his domestic fire from a frying-pan or from the house of a man who makes many
sacrifices, Cūdras excepted. The service begins with an evening oblation. After (the fire)
has been set in a blaze before sunset or sunrise, the sacrifice (is performed) after sunset
(and) after or before sunrise. He should make an oblation of rice-food fit for sacrifice
after washing it, if raw, with his hand (but) with a brass bowl if it is (not rice but) curds
or milk, or with the rice-pot. With the words 'Hail to Fire' (he makes oblation) in the
middle (of the fire, at eve); secondly in the north-eastern (part of the fire); in the morn.
ing, with the words, 'Hail to Sun' (he makes the first oblation). The wiping round and
other (acts) except sprinkling (of water round the fire) are here left out. Some say 'let
the wife make the oblations,' for this fire is the house-fire and the wife is the house
(home). When (the meal) is prepared, evening and morning, she (the wife) must say
а
## p. 206 (#240) ############################################
206
[сн.
LIFE AND CUSTOMS IN THE SŪTRAS
3
("It is) ready,' (and he) must say aloud 'Om'l, but softly May it not fail ; to thee2 be
reverence. ' Of rice-food fit for sacrifice he should make (oblations) to Prajāpati; and to
(the form of the Fire-god called) Svishțakſit (i. e. good sacrificer) make a bali (offering),
depositing it outside or inside (the fire place) in four places : (one) at the water-barrel;
(another) at the middle door ; (another) at the couch or privy; and (finally, one) at
the heap of sweepings ; sprinkle each (offering on the ground with water) beth (before
and afterwards) and pour out what is left with the water toward the south. Of chaff,
water, and scum of boiled rice (let him make a bali offering) when a donation has been
made. The gods to whom the bali offerings belong are Earth, Wind, Prajāpati, the All-
gods, Water, Herbs, Trees, Space, Love or Wrath, the hosts of Rakshasas, the Fathers
and Rudra. He should make the offering in silence; he should make it of any food
(but) make it only once in case (a meal) is prepared at different times; and if (prepared!
at different places (then he should make the offering of) what belongs to the house.
holder (himself). But of all food he should offer (some) in the fire and give the rest to
a priest : this he si ould do himself. He should offer the offerings himself from rice
(-harvest) to barley (-harvest) or from barley (-harvest) to rice (-harvest); (yea,) he
himself should offer them3.
It will have been observed that the religious ceremony of the bali-
offering implies a cult midway between that of the Vedic sacrifice and the
sectarian sacrifice not countenanced by the orthodox. The bali is a bit of
food cast upon the ground at the places named, the recipients being
supposed to be the Vedic divinities of a lower order, ending with Rudra,
and the hosts of harmful spirits who are thus propitiated. Each divinity
has a bali in his appropriate place and at the right time. Thus the offering
by the couch is for Love; that flung to the north is for Rudra ; that by
the door is for (personified) Space ; and the offering to the harmful spirits
are given at night. The sprinkling of the offering means (probably) the
sprinkling of the ground or place where the offering is cast. The Dharma
Sūtras also take up this question of offerings.
17 Jāt. I, 423 ; III, 446 : Dialogues I, 7, n. 4,
18 Market' and 'market-place' are frequently used by translators, but rather
inſei entially than as literal renderings.
## p. 193 (#227) ############################################
VIII ]
MEANS OF EXCHANGE
193
>
a
was hampered by slow transport, by individualistic production, and by
primitive machinery. But it was left free for the producer and dealer to
prevail by competition', and also by adulteration', and to bring about an
equation with a demand which was largely compact of customary usage and
relatively unaffected by the swifter fluctuations termed fashion.
Instances of price-haggling are not rare, and we have already noticed
the dealer's sense of the wear and tear of it, and a case of that more
developed competition which we know as 'dealing in futures. The outlay
in this case, for a carriage, a pavilion at the Benares docks, men (purisā),
and ushers (pātihārā), must have cut deep into his last profit of 1,000 coins,
but he was 20,000 per cent, to the good as the result of it! After this the
profit of 200 and 400 per cent. reaped by other traders falls a little flat, and
such economic thrills only revive when we consider the well-known story of
the fancy price obtained by Prince Jeta for his grove near Sāvatthi
from the pious merchant Anāthapiņdiika, limited only by the number of
coins (metal uncertain) required to cover the soil? .
At the same time custom may very well have settled price to a great
extent. “My wife is sometimes as meek as a 100-price slavegirl® reveals a
customary price. For the royal household, at least, prices were fixed
without appeal by th3 court valuer (agghakāraka) who stood between the
two fires of offending the king if he valued the goods submitted at their
full cost, or price as demanded, and of driving away tradesmen if he refused
bribes and cheapened the ware3º. On the other hand the king might
disgust him by too niggardly a bonuso. It may also have been the duty
of this official to assess the duty of one-twentieth on each consignment of
native merchandise imported into a city, and of one-tenth, plus a sample,
on each foreign import, as stated in the law-books of Manull, Gautama12,
and Baudhayānal3. Such octrois are alluded to in one Jātaka, where the
king remits to a subject the duty collected at the gates of his capital14.
Finally, it may have been his to assess merchants for their specific com-
mutation of the rājakāriya, namely, one article sold per month to the king
at a discount (arghāpacayena15).
The 'sample' mentioned above is suggestive of a surviving payment
made in kind. That the ancient systems of barter and of reckoning values
by cows or by rice-measures had for the most part been replaced by the use
1 Cf. Jät. III, 282 f.
3 Cf, 1b, 220.
3 Ib. I, 111 f. , 195 ; II, 222, 289, 424 f.
4 16. I, 99.
5 Ib. I, 121 f.
6 Ib. I, 109; cf. IV, 2.
7 Vin. II, 158 f. (Cull. V. VI, 4, 9) ; Jāi. I, 92.
8 Jåt. I, 299.
9 Jät. I, 124 f. ; II, 31 ; Pss. of Brethren 25, 212. 10 16. IV, 138.
11 VIII, 393-400; cf. Jät. IV, 132.
12 X, 26.
13 J, X, 18, vv. 14, 15.
14 Jāt. VI, 347.
15 Gaut. X, 35.
## p. 194 (#228) ############################################
194
[ch.
ECONOMIC CONDITIONS
a
a
of a metal currency, carrying well understood and generally accepted
exchange value, is attested by the earliest Buddhist literature. Barter
emerges in certain contingencies', as e. g. when a wanderer obtains a
meal from a woodlander for a gold pinº, or when among humble folk
a dog is bought for a kahāpaņa (kārshāpaņı) plus a cloak? . Barter was
also permitted in special commodities by the law-books ascribed to
Gautamat and Vasishtha’ and was prescribed in certain cases for the
Sangha“, to whom the use of money was forbidden'. Moreover, as
standard of value, it is possible that rice was still used when the Jātaka-
book was compiled.
But for the ordinary mechanism of exchange we find, in that and all
early Buddhist literature, the worth of every marketable commodity,
that of a dead mouse and a day at the festival up to all kinds of prices, fees,
pensions, fines, loans, stored treasure, and income, stated in figures of a
certain coin, or its fractions. This is either stated, or implied to be, the
kahapāņa. Of the coins called purāņas this literature knows nothing Other
current instruments of exchange are the ancient nikkha (nishka – a gold coin,
originally a gold ornament)0, the suvanna, also of gold, and such bronze or
copper tokens as the kamsa, the pāda, the māsaka (māsha), and the
kākānikā. Cowry shells (sippikāni) are once mentioned', but only as we
should speak of doits or mites, not as anything still having currenoy.
That there was instability as to the relative value of standard or token
coins in place and time we learn from the Vinaya : ‘At that time (of Bimbi-
sara or Ajātasattu), at Rājagaha, five māsakas were equal to one pada 12.
Again, the nikkha was valued now at five 13, now at four suvannas14.
Of substitutes for money, such as instruments of credit, we read of
signet rings used as deposit or securityls, of wife or children pledged or sold
for debt16, and of IOU's or debt-sheets (inapannāni)". The bankrupt who, in,
the Jātaka tale, invites his creditors to bring their debt-sheets for settlement,
only to drown himself before their eyesls, appears in a Milinda simile antici-
pating the crisis by making a public statement of his liabilities and assetslthe
entanglement and anxieties of debt as well as the corporate liability belonging
to communistic life in a religious order rendered it necessary to debar any
1
1
1 There seems to be nothing in the text of Jātaka I, 251(Vāruņi Ját. ) to justify the
translator's inference that barter was normal; see J. R. A. S. , 1901, p. 876.
2 Jāt VI, 519.
3 Ib II, 247
4 VII, 16 f.
5 II, 37 f.
6 l'in. II, 174 (Cull. V. VI. 19).
7 l'in. III, 237; II, 294 ff. (Cull. V. XII, I ff. ).
8 Ját. I, 124 f.
9 For details of prices see Mrs. Rhys Davids, J. R. A. S. , 1901, pr. 882 f.
lo Zimmer, Altindisches Leben, 259.
11 Jāt. 1, 425 f. 12 l'in. III, 45. 13 Childers, Poli Dictionary, s. v. nikkho.
14 Manu, VIII, 137. For a more detailed discussion see J. R. A. S. , 1901, p. 877 ff.
15 Jāt. I, 121. 16 16. VI, 521; Therig. 444.
17 Jāt I, 230 ; ef. 227, panne äropetvä.
18 16. IV, 256.
19 Mil. 131 (text); cf. 279.
-----------
## p. 195 (#229) ############################################
VIII ]
GENERAL CONCLUSIONS
195
a
candidate from admission to the Sangha who was a debtor! . And the sight
of a deposited security recalling the past circumstances of the pledging is
instanced in the Milinda as case of the physical process of recollection
(rati)
No definite rates of interest on money loans appear in the early books.
But the term which appears in the law-books as 'usury' (vrddhi, Pāli vaddhi)
is found. Meaning literally profit or increase, it may very early have acquired
the more specialised import. There is a tolerant tone concerning the money-
lender in a Jātaka tale, where a patron, in enabling a huntsman to better
himself, names money-lending (iņa-dāna), together with tillage, trade,
and harvesting as four honest callings? Gautama is equally tolerant*.
But the general tendency of this profession to evade any legal or customary
rate of interest and become the type of profit-mongering finds condemnation
in other law-books. Hypocritical ascetics are accused of practising itº. No
one but the money-lender seems to have lent capital wealth for interest as
an investment. For instance, only bonds (paņņā) are spoken of in the case
of the generous Anāthapiņdika's 'bad debts'? . Capital wealth was hoarded,
either in the house—in large mansions over the entrance passage (dvāra.
kotịhaka)—under the ground', in brazen jars under the river bank, 10 or
deposited with a friendll. The nature and amount of the wealth thus
hoarded was registered on gold or copper plates12.
Fragmentary as are the collected scraps of evidence on which the
foregoing outlines of social economy have been constructed, more might
yet be inferred did space permit. It shɔuld, however, be fairly clear from
what has been said, that if, during, say, the seventh to the fourth century
B. C. it had been the vogue, in India, to write treatises on economic
institutions, there might have come down to us the record both of
conventions and of theories as orderly and as relatively acceptable to the
peoples as anything of the kind in, say, the latter middle ages was to
the peoples of Western Europe. But it is a curious fact that often where
the historian finds little material to hand wherewith to rebuild, he judges
that there never were any buildings. Thus in a leading historical work on
economics, revised and enlarged in 1890, the whole subject of the economic
ideas of the ‘Orient' is dismissed in a single page as being reducible to a few
ethical precepts, and as extolling agriculture and decrying arts and com-
merce ; further, that division of labour, though politically free, stiffened
>
2
p. 80.
>
1 Vin. I, 76 (Mah. I, 46) ; cf. D. I, 71 f.
3 Jät. IV, 422 4 X, 6 ; XI, 21.
5 Vas. II, 41, 42 ; Baudh. I, 5, 1023. 5 ; Manu, IIT, 153, 189 ; VIII, 152, 153.
6 åt. IV, 181.
7 Jāt. I, 227.
8 1b 1, 351 ; II, 431.
9 1b. I, 225, 375 f. , 424 ; II, 308 ; III, 24, 116
10 1b. I, 227, 323.
11 16. VI, 521.
12 16. IV, 7, 488 ; VI, 29 ; cf. IV, 237.
## p. 196 (#230) ############################################
196
[CH.
ECONOMIC CONDITIONS
1
into a system of hereditary caste, arresting economic progress, and that the
Chinese alone, and only from the seventh century A. D. , had any insight into
the nature of money and its fiduciary substitutes. But we have been
looking behind the ethical precepts of the preacher, and the sectarian
scruples of a class, at the life of the peoples of North India, as it survives
in the records of their folk-lore, and of the discipline of the brethren
in orders who lived in close touch with all classes. And we have seen
agriculture diligently and amicably carried on by practically the whole
people as a toilsome but most natural and necessary pursuit. We have seen
crafts and commerce flourishing, highly organised corporately and locally,
under conditions of individual and corporate competition, the leading
men thereof the friends and counsellors of kings. We have found ‘labour'
largely hereditary, yet, therewithal, a mobility and initiative anything
but rigid revealed in the exercise of it. And we have discovered a thorough
familiarity with money and credit ages before the ‘seventh century A. D. '
1 L. Cossa, Introduction to Political Economy.
## p. 197 (#231) ############################################
CHAPTER IX
THE PERIOD OF THE SŪTRAS, EPICS, AND LAW-BOOKS
a
The later Brāhman literature which, whatever may be the age of
its representative works in their present from, undoubtedly had its roots
in a period at least as early as the rise of Jainism and Buddhism, may
be classified under the four headings-Sūtras, Epic poems, Law-books,
and Purāņas. These belong to two distinct species of literary composition,
the Sūtras being broadly distinguished from the others both in from
and object.
The purpose of the Sūtras, so called from the word sūtra which means
'a thread,' is to afford a clue through the mazes of Brāhmanical learning
contained in the Brāhmaṇas.
In the form of a series of short sentences
they codify and systematise the various branches of knowledge sacred and
secular. They are intended to satisfy the needs of a system of oral
instruction, so that each step in the exposition of a subject may be learnt
progressively and a convenient analysis of the whole committed to memory
by the student. The earliest Sūtras are in the priestly language and
represent a phase which is transitional between the language of the
Brāhmaṇas and Classical Sanskrit as fixed by the grammarians.
The Epics supply the model both for language and form which
is followed by the Law-books and the Purāņas. Their source is to be traced
to the traditional recitations of bards who were neither priests nor scholars.
Their language is thus naturally more popular in character and less
regular than Classical Sanskrit. In many respects it does not conform to
the laws laid down by the grammarians, and is ignored by them. This
became the conventional language of epic poetry, which was used also
in the Law-books, the subject matter of which was taken to a great extent
from the Sūtras, and in the Purāņas, which, as they stand at present, belong
to a period not earlier than the fourth century a. d. The metres of the Law.
books and the Purāņas are also substantially those of the Epic poems.
1 Wackernagel, Altind. Gram. vol. I, p. xiv.
197
## p. 198 (#232) ############################################
1. 98
[ CA.
THE PERIOD OF SŪTRAS, EPICS, ETC.
The period of the Sūtras, Epics, and Law-books thus overlaps that
of Buddhist India on the one hand, and reaches well into the period of the
extant Purāṇas on the other. The earliest known Purāņa precedes the
later law-books probably by centuries, as the Sūtras precede the earliest
works of Buddhism. Nevertheless it is not only new matter which is
offered by the literature, whether legal or epic, but virtually a new phase,
a fresh point of view, the life of India as it shows itself under the dominion
of the Brāhmans, who have been the real masters of Indian thought for
more than three millenniums. It is in fact the continuation under new con-
ditions of the history depicted above, before Jain and Buddhist had arisen.
As we read the works of these important sects we receive the im-
pression that the world of India was one in which the ancient priestly caste
had lost its authority ; that nobles and wealthy merchants were more
regarded than Brāhmans. But it must be remembered that, despite the
wide reach of Buddhism when in its full power, it influenced at first only
that part of the country where it arose, and that the earlier writings depict-
ing the life and teaching of Buddha represent chiefly the circumstances
found in a very circumscribed area, in fact just the area where Brāhmanism
was weakest. The elements of social life were the same here as elsewhere,
but they were not arranged in the same way. The stronghold of Brahmanism
lay to the West, and there the priest had had his say and built up his power
among clans boasting direct descent from Vedic heroes and more inclined
to bow to the mysterious Vedic word of which the only custodian was the
Brāhman priest. In short, as Brāhmanism exaggerates the power of the
priest, so Buddhism belittles it unduly, not because it sets out to do so but
because each represents a special point of view based more or less upon
gecgraphical position. Owing, however, to a still later interpretation of
caste, our modern ideas on the subject are apt to be peculiarly confused.
To understand the social order into which we enter as we begin the study of
the Sūtras, epics, and law-books, we must renounce altogether the notion of
caste in its strict modern sense, as on the other hand we must free ourselves
from the thought that the whole caste-system is merely a priestly hypothesis
disproved by the conditions revealed in Buddhistic writings.
In point of fact, even the Buddhist writings recognise the formal
castes ; and it is simply impossible that a social structure widely pervading
as that of the so-called castes, a structure revealed not by didactic works
alone but implicitly as well as explicitly presented to us in every body of
writings whether orthodox or heterodox, should have been made out of
whole cloth. What we loosely call by this name to-day are later refine-
ments ; and we do, not need to turn to Buddhist works to show that in
ancient times the castes were merely orders socially distinct but not very
strictly seperated or ramified into such sub-divisional castes as obtain at
the present time.
1
## p. 199 (#233) ############################################
IX]
OUTLINES OF CHRONOLOGY
199
Yet before giving the proof of this in detail, it will be well to con-
sider briefly the chronology of the works to be reviewed in relation to the
general character and history of the states in which they arose. The legal
literature which begins with the Sūtras and is represented in the epics does
not really end at all, as works of this nature continue to be written down to
modern times, chiefly by eminent jurists who comment on older works.
But, after eliminating the modern jurists and confining ourselves to the
law-books which may be called classic, we still find that the terminus falls
well into the middle of the first millennium of our era ; and as the beginning
of this literature in Sūtra style reaches back at least as far as this before
the beginning of our era, the whole period is rather more than a thousand
years, about the middle of which must be set the time to which the epic
poems are to be assigned as works already known and perhaps nearly
completed
The cycle thus designated as a millennium is one of very varied
political fortunes ; and the social, political and religious material of the
legal and epical literature must necessarily be explained in accordance with
the outward changes. What these changes were is described in detail in
other chapters of this work. For our present purpose it is necessary only to
recount them in outline. At the end of the sixth century B. c. , early in
the period to which the Sūtras belong, the Persian Empire held two provin-
ces in N. W. India - Gandhāra, the present districts of Peshāwar and
Rāwalpindi, and the 'Indian' province, that is to say, the country of the
Lower Indus : and the northern part of India generally was dominated by
peoples of the Aryan race who had descended from the Punjab and spread
eastward for centuries, but not so that the recently acquired territory was
thoroughly assimilated to the cults and culture of the invaders, nor so that
any one of these invaders had established an empire. Long before the end
of this same period, Buddha, Mahāvīra, and other reformers had broken
with the cult derived from the Vedic age, and the great empire of Açoka had
made a new epoch in political life. This alteration, however, had been in-
troduced, though adventitiously, through outer rather than inner conditions.
After the short campaign in the Punjab, made by Alexander as the conquer-
or of the Persian Empire, his Indian dominions were, within few years,
absorbed by the growing power of Magadha (S. Bihār) then under the
sway of a usurper, Chandragupta (c. 321-297 B. c. ) the low-born son of
Murā and the founder of the Maurya empire. This empire extended from
Pāțaliputra (Patna) to Herāt and was maintained by an army of approxi-
mately 700,000 men, the first real empire in India. His successors,
Bindusāra and Acoka, enlarged the empire annexing Kalinga on the eastern
coast and ruling as far south as Madras. This dynasty continued in power
till the end of the Sūtra period : and under it, during the reign of Açoka
## p. 200 (#234) ############################################
200
[CH.
THE PERIOD OF SŪTRAS, EPICS, ETC.
>
>
(c. 274-236 B. c. ) Buddhism became the court-religion. Açoka's period is
determined by the mention in his edicts of certain Hellenic princes who were
his contemporaries, but after his reign there comes a period of less chrono-
logical certainty. The different versions of the Purāņas are not in agree-
ment as to the exact number of his successors; but they are unanimous in
asserting that the Maurya dynasty lasted for 137 years : that is to say, it is
supposed to have come to an end c. 184 B. C. For over a century after its
fall the Çunga dynasty, whose founder, Pushyamitra, had slain Bșihadratha
Maurya and usurped his throne, held sway, despite forcible inroads of the
Yavanas (Greeks) and the Andhras; and we learn that both Pushyamitra
and the Andhra King, Çātakarņi, performed the famous horse-sacrifice,' in
accordance with the ancient Vedic rite, thus challenging all opponents of
their authority. The son of this Pushyamitra was Agnimitra, who conquer-
ed Vidarbha, (Berār), then a province of the Andhra Empire of S. India, and
the grandson, who guarded the horse, was Vasumitra. These names, as
also the re-establishment of the ‘horse-sacrifice', are highly significant in that
they show a renascence of the Vedic religion and a consequent decline in
Buddhism. The same thing is indicated by the fact that Khåravela, a king
of Kalinga, who boasts of having invaded the Andhra dominions as well as
Northern India, was a Jain. Sumitra, the son of Agnimitra, was, according
to Bāņa's historical romance, the Harshācharita, miserably slain by
Mitradeva, who may perhaps have been a Brāhman of the Kaņva family
which eventually gained the chief power in the state. The account given
by the Purāņas states that the minister Vasudeva slew the tenth and last of
the Çunga kings and inaugurated a new dynasty, called the Kaņva dynasty,
which lasted for about half a century ; but, since the Kanvas are difinitely
styled 'servants of the Çungas' and for other reasons, it seems more probable
that the later Çunga kings had been reduced to subjection by their Brāhman
ministers, and that the lists of thesecont emporary rulers nominal and actual
were wrongly regarded by some late editor of the Purāņas as successive. It
is further related that one of the Andhra kings' slew Suçarman, the last of
the Kanvas, and thus brought Magadha under the sway of the sovereigns,
whose names and titles, as well as their sacrificial inscriptions, show them to
have been followers of the ancient Vedic religion. But here again it appears
that dynastic lists have been brought together and arranged in an unreal se-
quence. There can be little doubt that the first of the Andhra kings was ear-
lier in date than the first of the Çungas, and not 157 years later as would
appear from the Purāņas. It is indeed doubtful if the Andhras ever ruled
in Magadha : but their sway in Central and Southern India lasted until the
middle of the third century A. D. ?
1 The Purăņas say the founder of the dynasty, Simuka, but the chronological
difficulties which this statement involves seem to be unsurmountablo.
2 See Chapters XIII (the Purāņas); XVIII-XX (the Maurya Empire) ; XXI
(Indian Native States); XXIV (the earlier Andhras).
3
## p. 201 (#235) ############################################
IX]
WIDER POLITICAL OUTLOOK
201
>
In the meantime, on the decline of the Maurya empire which must
have set in soon after the death of the Emperor Açoka (c. 236 B. c. ) the
Punjab passed into the hands of foreign invaders - first, Greeks from the
kingdom of Bactria to the north, and subsequently Scythians (Çakas) and
Parthians (Pahlavas) from the kingdom of Parthia to the west. The
kingdoms established by these new-comers in the Punjab were overwhelm-
ed by still another wave of invasion from the north. The Kushāņas, a people
from the reign of China who had driven the Çakas out of Bactria, began
their Indian conquests with the overthrow of the kingdom of Kābul about
the middle of the first century A. D. , and extended their power until, in the
reign of Kanishka (probably 78 A. D. ), the patron of that branch of the
Buddhist Church which is called the Mahāyāna, the Kushāņa empire was
paramount in N. Indial.
In Western India we can to some extent trace from inscriptions and
coins the varying fortunes in the conflict between the Andhras and the in-
vaders of N. India, and the establishment in Kāthiāwār and Cutch of a
dynasty of Çaka satraps, originally no doubt feudatories of the Kushāņas,
which lasted till c. 390 A. D. when it was overthrown by the Guptas.
The period of the Gupta empire which dates from 319 A. D. is a most
important epoch in the history of Sanskrit literature. It is the golden
age of Classical Sanskrit ; and in it most of the Purāṇas and the works
belonging to the later legal literature appear to have assumed their present
form.
This brief conspectus of the conditions obtaining in India during the
time to which we have to assign the Sūtras, epics, and legal works will show
that other influences than those with which we have been dealing hitherto
are to be expected ; and these are indeed found, but not to such an extent
as might have been anticipated. These influences are indeed to be traced
rather in the general enlargement of vision of the writers than in specific
details. The simple village life with which for the most part the Sūtras
are concerned, the government of a circumscribed district by a local rāja,
are gradually exchanged for the life reflected from large towns and imperial
power. Though this is more noticeable in the epics, it may be detected in
the later Sūtras and again in the still later law-books. During this period
the power of Buddhism increased and then, reaching its culmination, began
to wane, The world of India by the second century before Christ was
already becoming indifferent to the teaching of Buddhism and was being
reabsorbed into the great permanent cults of Vishņu and Çiva, with which
in spirit Buddhism itself began to be amalgamated. The Brāhman priests
reasserted themselves ; animal sacrifices, forbidden by Açoka, were no longer
under the royal ban ; and with this open expression of the older cult the
1 For these foreign invaders of India see Chapters XXII, XXIII.
;
## p. 202 (#236) ############################################
202
(ch.
THE PERIOD OF SŪTRAS, EPICS, ETC.
whole system of Brāhmanism revived, fostered alike by the temple priests
and their ritualism and by the philosophers, who regarded Buddhism as
both a detestable heresy and a false interpretation of life.
But there is little apparent influence from outside, despite, the wider
political outlook ; and where such influence might be looked for with great-
est certainty, namely in the effect of Greek domination, it is practically nil.
Only the Yavanas, literally 'Ionians', a people or peoples of Greek descent
who may be traced in Indian literature and inscriptions from the third
century B. c. to the second century A. D. , and who were manifestly a factor of
no small importance in the political history of Northern and Western India
– they are celebrated as great fighters in the Mahābhārata and other litera-
ture- remain to show that the conquest of Alexander and the Greek
invasion from Bactria had any result. Other indications point rather to
Persia than to Hellas. Thus the title Satrap, which was continued in use
by Alexander, still remains under Çakas and Kushāṇas to testify to the long
Persian dominion in N. W. India. Apart from this, political and social
relations do not appear to be affected at all either by Hellenic or by Persian
influence. The native army remains of the same sort, though greatly
enlarged. The social theory remains practically the same, save that a place
among degraded 'outcastes' is given to Yavanas as to other barbarians.
Architecture and the arts of sculpture, gem-engraving and coinage do indeed
bear witness, especially in the N. W. region of India to the influence of
Persia and Greece during this period, just as at a later date, native astrono-
my was affected, and indeed practically superseded by the system of
Alexandria. But the period with which we are dealing at present does not
make it necessary to inquire into the relation between India and the outer
world in respect to science. The idea that Indian epic poetry itself is due
to Hellenic influence has indeed been suggested ; but as a theory this idea
depends on so nebulous a parallel of plot that it has received no support.
>
## p. 203 (#237) ############################################
CHAPTER X
FAMILY LIFE AND SOCIAL CUSTOMS AS THEY
APPEAR IN THE SŪTRAS
The general period of the Sūtras extends from the sixth or seventh
century before Christ to about the second century. It is evident that the
different Vedic schools had Sūtras which were revised, or replaced by new
Sūtras, at various periods, and that some of these extended into later
centuries than others. Thus it would be a mistake to limit all the Sūtras of
all the schools to certain centuries. The Sūtras are manuals of instruction ;
and those which are of interest historically formed but a part of a large
volume, which was intended primarily for the guidance of religious teachers
and treated mainly of the sacrifice and other religious matters. Except for
students of ceremonial details these sacrificial works (Çrauta Sūtras) are of
no interest. What concerns us at present is that portion of the whole which
goes by the name of Gộihya and Dharma Sūtras, that is, manuals of
conduct in domestic and social relations. In some cases the rules given in
these two divisions are identical; and the two divisions are treated in such a
way as to condense one division for the sake of not repeating directions
given in the other. For our purpose they may be regarded as forming one
body containing rules of life not especially connected with the performance
of the greater sacrifices. · They differ mainly as representing the views of
different schools on minute points or as products of different parts of the
country, and as earlier or later opinions. All of them claim to be based
upon Vedic teaching. Thus the Grihya and Dharma Sūtras of Āpastamba
form but a few chapters of a work called the Kalpa, of which twenty-four
a
chapters teach the proper performance of sacrifice and only two treat of the
sacred law, while one abridged chapter gives the rules for the performance
of domestic ceremonies. Again this special ‘law-book’ is not a law-book
having universal application, but is a product of a Vedic school belonging
to the Andhras in the south-east of India ; and, thirdly, it combats some of
the opinions expressed by writers on the same subject. Somewhat similar
203
## p. 204 (#238) ############################################
204
(CH.
LIFE AND CUSTOMS IN THE SUTRAS
>
conditions prevail in the case of the other Sūtras. They are, in short, local
manuals which form complete wholes only by virtue of their subject-matter,
but which, to their authors, were merely sections of a greater work, the
chief importance of which lay in the handing down of traditional
knowledge in regard to religious practices. They may be regarded, however,
as the first steps in the evolution of legal literature ; for the metrical Çāstras
or law-bocks are only the extension and completion of the rules of the
Dharma Sūtras, with a gradual increase in the part allotted to civil and
criminal law and a relaxation of the bond connecting the Sūtras with
definite Vedic sects. The Dharma Sūtras are more universal ; the Grihya ·
Sūtras reflect individual schools. But even the Gșihyas are not Çrauta
(divinely revealed), but Smärta (sacred tradition).
The content of the Grihya Sūtras as is implied by the name, is narrower
than that of the Dharma Sūtras. The first contain, however, to all students
of folk-lore a store-house of material in regard to rites and superstitions
connected with home life, such as no other body of literature in the world
presents. In the first place, the life of man is traced religiously from boy-
hood to burial. Every important phase of a man's existence is accompanied
with its appropriate rite ; and, incidentally, what to do and what not to do,
injunctions, prohibitions, taboos, are taught as general rules of conduct.
The greater events, birth, marriage, death, are described in their religious
setting, each with minute detail, so that not only are the sacred texts cited
which should be repeated on every occasion, but the physical acts to which
the texts are ancillary are described. For example, such a text must be
repeated while a dead man's bones are being collected. The one who collects
them must pick them up with such and such fingers and place them in just
such a jar. The wedding verses are indicated ; the bride must make just so
many steps and pour out grain with her hands held in just such a position,
etc. Some of the Vedic schools, instead of embracing all the Sūtras in one
work as a Kalpa Sūtra, have apparently laid so much stress on these
domestic rites that the manuals have become independent works, thus fore-
shadowing what happened later in the case of the Çāstras. The complete
work, embracing all kinds of Sūtras, as was to be expected, to the
Yajurveda schools, since the priests of this Veda were from the beginning
particularly concerned with manual exercises, in arranging the altar, etc. ,
and the details of sacrifice ; while the priests of the other Vedas had to do
more with the recitation and chanting of the sacred texts. Nevertheless, the
literature of the Rigveda also contains both Çrauta and Grihya Sūtras, as
does that of the Sāmaveda. Finally, the Atharvaveda possesses not only
a Väitāna Crauta Sūtra but a Kançika Sūtra, which is in part a Gșihya
Sūtra but contains also directions for carrying out the many magic cere-
monies connected with the text of that unique Veda.
a
## p. 205 (#239) ############################################
X].
THE GRIHYA SŪTRAS
205
case.
The preponderance of domestic ceremonies in the Gșihya Sūtra results
in Dharma, or social, matter being introduced rather adventitiously, as
when the rules concerning the choice of wives are given, whereas Grinya,
domestic, rules belong as much to the Dharma Sūtras as to the Gșihya
Sūtras themselves. The difference is that the weight in the Dharmas is
laid on the wider relation of man to the state, so that those sections which
deal with the family become condensed and subordinate. Specimens of
southern Gțihya Sutras are also not lacking. Thus as the Dharma of
Āpastamba reflects a South-Indian origin, so also the Gșihya Sūtra of
Khādira belongs to Southern India, and it is an indication that Sutra
literature extends far beyond the time of Buddha that this should be the
Such also may be surmised to be the fact (rather than that Vedic
schools were domiciled in South India at a much earlier period) from the
circumstance that the Sūtra of Khădira is a later and more concise version
of the Sūtra of Gobhila. There are other examples of this endeavour to
revise a Sūtra on lines of economy, each later writer reducing the work
of his predecessor as much as possible or convenient, conciseness being the
test of Sūtra excellence. Gobhila's work is detailed and lengthy ; Khādira's
is virtually the same work in condensed form. Everything that could be
omitted, such as explanatory digressions, smaller details of ceremonies, etc. ,
was left out, solely to make the work easier to remember. But clearness
as well as conciseness was aimed at and attained by a fresh arrangement of
the older matter.
An example of the scope and method of a Gộihya Sūtra may be taken
from the directions of Khădira regarding the little oblations to spirits and
gods required from a wedded pair. After describing the wedding ceremony,
Khādira passes directly to this question of offerings and oblations, describ-
ing first briefly the fire used for the purpose of receiving the oblation, thus :
The domestic (grihua) fire is that at which he has taken her hand (in marriage) or
that on which he has put the last piece of wood (as a student before marriage) or a(fresh)
fire twirled out (of wood), the last being pure but not tending to prosperity ; or he may
get his domestic fire from a frying-pan or from the house of a man who makes many
sacrifices, Cūdras excepted. The service begins with an evening oblation. After (the fire)
has been set in a blaze before sunset or sunrise, the sacrifice (is performed) after sunset
(and) after or before sunrise. He should make an oblation of rice-food fit for sacrifice
after washing it, if raw, with his hand (but) with a brass bowl if it is (not rice but) curds
or milk, or with the rice-pot. With the words 'Hail to Fire' (he makes oblation) in the
middle (of the fire, at eve); secondly in the north-eastern (part of the fire); in the morn.
ing, with the words, 'Hail to Sun' (he makes the first oblation). The wiping round and
other (acts) except sprinkling (of water round the fire) are here left out. Some say 'let
the wife make the oblations,' for this fire is the house-fire and the wife is the house
(home). When (the meal) is prepared, evening and morning, she (the wife) must say
а
## p. 206 (#240) ############################################
206
[сн.
LIFE AND CUSTOMS IN THE SŪTRAS
3
("It is) ready,' (and he) must say aloud 'Om'l, but softly May it not fail ; to thee2 be
reverence. ' Of rice-food fit for sacrifice he should make (oblations) to Prajāpati; and to
(the form of the Fire-god called) Svishțakſit (i. e. good sacrificer) make a bali (offering),
depositing it outside or inside (the fire place) in four places : (one) at the water-barrel;
(another) at the middle door ; (another) at the couch or privy; and (finally, one) at
the heap of sweepings ; sprinkle each (offering on the ground with water) beth (before
and afterwards) and pour out what is left with the water toward the south. Of chaff,
water, and scum of boiled rice (let him make a bali offering) when a donation has been
made. The gods to whom the bali offerings belong are Earth, Wind, Prajāpati, the All-
gods, Water, Herbs, Trees, Space, Love or Wrath, the hosts of Rakshasas, the Fathers
and Rudra. He should make the offering in silence; he should make it of any food
(but) make it only once in case (a meal) is prepared at different times; and if (prepared!
at different places (then he should make the offering of) what belongs to the house.
holder (himself). But of all food he should offer (some) in the fire and give the rest to
a priest : this he si ould do himself. He should offer the offerings himself from rice
(-harvest) to barley (-harvest) or from barley (-harvest) to rice (-harvest); (yea,) he
himself should offer them3.
It will have been observed that the religious ceremony of the bali-
offering implies a cult midway between that of the Vedic sacrifice and the
sectarian sacrifice not countenanced by the orthodox. The bali is a bit of
food cast upon the ground at the places named, the recipients being
supposed to be the Vedic divinities of a lower order, ending with Rudra,
and the hosts of harmful spirits who are thus propitiated. Each divinity
has a bali in his appropriate place and at the right time. Thus the offering
by the couch is for Love; that flung to the north is for Rudra ; that by
the door is for (personified) Space ; and the offering to the harmful spirits
are given at night. The sprinkling of the offering means (probably) the
sprinkling of the ground or place where the offering is cast. The Dharma
Sūtras also take up this question of offerings.
