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The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c21: Chapter X. Family Life and Social Customs as They Appear in the Sūtras

The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c21

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Chapter X. Family Life and Social Customs as They Appear in the Sūtras

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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 Gṛihya 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 Gṛihya and Dharma Sūtras of Āpastamba form but a few chapters of a work called the Kalpa, of which twenty-four 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 conditions prevail in the case of the other Sūtras.

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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-books 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 Gṛihya Sūtras reflect individual schools. But even the Gṛihyas are not *Çrauta* (divinely revealed), but *Smārta* (sacred tradition).

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The content of the Gṛihya 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 boyhood 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, belongs, 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 Gṛihya Sūtras, as does that of the Sāmaveda. Finally, the Atharvaveda possesses not only a Vāitāna Çrauta Sūtra but a Kauçika Sūtra, which is in part a Gṛihya Sūtra but contains also directions for carrying out the many magic ceremonies connected with the text of that unique Veda.

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The preponderance of domestic ceremonies in the Gṛihya Sūtra results in Dharma, or social, matter being introduced rather adventitiously, as when the rules concerning the choice of wives are given, whereas Gṛihya, domestic, rules belong as much to the Dharma Sūtras as to the Gṛihya 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 Gṛihya Sūtras are also not lacking. Thus as the Dharma of Āpastamba reflects a South-Indian origin, so also the Gṛihya Sūtra of Khādira belongs to Southern India; and it is an indication that Sūtra literature extends far beyond the time of Buddha that this should be the case. 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 Khādira 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.

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An example of the scope and method of a Gṛihya Sūtra may be taken from the directions of Khādira 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, describing first briefly the fire used for the purpose of receiving the oblation, thus:

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The domestic (*gṛihya*) 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, Çūdras excepted. The service begins with an evening oblation. After (the fire) has been set in a blaze before sunset or

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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 morning, 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 (‘It is) ready,’ (and he) must say aloud ‘Om’¹, 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) Svishtakrit (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 or the ground with water) both (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 best to a priest; this he should 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.

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¹ Om is the sacred syllable, answering in cases like that above to ‘very good’ (Amen). The evening and morning are mentioned in this order because the evening precedes the day; and only two meals are mentioned because the Hindus eat but twice a day.

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² In the Sūtras clarity is often sacrificed to brevity. It is not clear here whether the wife or husband speaks or to whom the word ‘Thee’ refers. Presumably the husband addresses the words to the food itself (compare Gobhila’s *Grihya Sūtra*, I, 3, 18). The text and translation (by Prof. Oldenberg) of Khādira are published in *S.B.E.* vol. xxix.

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³ That is from spring till autumn the householder offers barley, and from rice-time till barley-harvest time (autumn till spring) he offers rice. The passage quoted is also translated by Prof. Oldenberg, in *S.B.E.* vol. xxix, p. 385.

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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 offerings 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. The citation above by implication recognises only the wife as preparer of the meal. But a rich householder may have his meals prepared by a priest or other member of the ‘reborn’ castes or even by a Çūdra. Special rules are necessary in the last case. The slave-cook, being impure, must have his hair and beard and nails cut daily or at least at stated intervals, and it must be the householder who places on the fire the food prepared by Çūdras. Then in this case it is the cook who says (when the meal is prepared), ‘It is ready’ and the householder who responds (as Āpastamba gives the rule, with a slight variation) ‘Well-prepared food bestows splendour; may it never fail.’

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The rites involving the goblins of disaster and disease have naturally a prominent place in the domestic ritual of the Gṛihya Sūtras and afford us glimpses of an otherwise unknown pantheon. The wife herself, who has so little to do with texts, must go outside her house and offer food to ‘the white demon with black teeth, the lord of bad women,’ and if she bears a child the husband must daily, till the wife’s confinement ends, offer rice and mustard in the fire near the door where the wife is confined, dispersing demons whose names are given: ‘Çaṇḍa, Marka, Upavīra, Çauṇḍikeya, Ulūkhala, Malimlucha, Droṇāsa, Chyavana,’ all indicative of trouble, as are those that follow (apparently a supplementary list), ‘Ālikhat, Animisha, Kiṃvadanta, Upaçruti, Haryaksha, Kumbhin, Çatru, Pātrapāṇi, Nṛimaṇi, Hantrīmukha, Sarshapāruṇa, Chyavana, avaunt’.¹ But if the child falls ill with epilepsy, the ‘dog-disease,’ the father cures him by covering him with a net and murmuring,

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¹ Pāraskara, *Gṛihya Sūtra*, I, 16, 23 f.

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Kūrkura, Su-Kūrkura, Kūrkura (it is) who holds fast the children; scat (*chech chet!*), dog, let him go; reverence to thee, Sīsara, barker, bender; true the gods have given thee a boon, and hast thou chosen my boy? Scat, dog, let him go (as before). True, the bitch of heaven, Saramā, is thy mother, Sīsara is thy father, and Yama’s black and speckled dogs thy brothers; but scat, dog, let him go².

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² *Ib.* 24.

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The demon attacking the boy is here called Kumāra, the cult is obviously demoniac. In general, the Sūtras of this class are concerned not with the greater sacrifices, which are discussed in the Çrauta Sūtra, called the Havis and Soma sacrifices, but with the so-called great sacrifices of food cooked (*pāka*) and offered on special noon-days and at funeral feasts, four or seven in all, including offerings to serpents as well as to demons and gods¹.

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¹ From the full moon of the month Çrāvaṇa, offerings to snakes have to be made daily till it is safe to sleep on the ground again. This is called the *Pratyavarohaṇa* and occurs on the full moon day called *Āgrahāyaṇī*, when one may ‘descend again’ (from the high couch).

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The last of these domestic ‘cooked-food’ sacrifices introduces a new feature:

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On the full moon day of the month Chaitra he makes (images of) a pair of animals out of meal; (he offers) them and jujube leaves (to the gods); to Indra and Agni a figure with prominent navel; and balls to Rudra (Çāṅkhāyana, *Gṛihya Sūtra*, iv, 19).

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These images of meal representing living beings are partly due to the new feeling of pity for animals and the desire not to injure life, which plays a part in Brāhmanism as well as in Buddhism. It must be admitted, however, that economy had something to do with the substitution of animals of meal for real animals, but ostensibly it is a Vishṇuite trait. The general rule in this regard is that attributed to Manu: ‘Animals may be killed (so said Manu) at the Madhuparka and Soma sacrifice and at the rites for Manes and gods.’ But it is an old rite of hospitality to kill a cow for a guest²; and, as a matter of form, each honoured guest is actually offered a cow. The host says to the guest, holding the knife ready to slay the cow, that he has the cow for him; but the guest is then directed to say: ‘Mother of Rudras, daughter of the Vasus, sister of the Ādityas, navel of immortality (is she). Do not kill the guiltless cow; she is (Earth itself), Aditi, the goddess. I speak to them that understand.’ He adds, ‘My sin has been killed and that of so-and-so; let her go and eat grass.’ But if he really wants to have her eaten, he says, ‘I kill my sin and the sin of so-and-so’ (in killing her), and though in many cases the offer of the cow is thus plainly a formal piece of etiquette, yet the offering to the guest was not complete without flesh of some sort; and it is clear from the formulas that any of the worthiest guests might demand the cow’s death, though as the ‘six worthy guests’ are teacher, priest, father-in-law, king, friend, and Āryan ‘reborn’ man, and all of these were doubtless well grounded in that veneration for the cow which is expressed above by identifying her with Earth (as Aditi), there was probably seldom any occasion to harrow the feelings of the cow-revering host³. Pāraskara mentions only the cow but Çāṅkhāyana (*G.S.*, ii, 15, 1) already substitutes a goat as a possible alternative; he also mentions the gods to which this animal is sacred, that is, he seeks to make the animal offered to the guest a sacrifice to a god. Thus he says that if the animal is offered to the teacher and killed it is ‘sacred to the Fire-god’; if it is offered to a king, it is sacred to Indra, and if to a friend (*mitra*) it is sacred to Mitra. Similar additions may be traced in many particulars, sometimes found by comparing one text with another, sometimes clearly interpolated.

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² Chapter iv, p. 101.

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³ Pāraskara, *Gṛihya Sūtra*, I, 3, 26.

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The Sūtras, while they do not recognise the sects of later days, yet point to the different conception of deity embodied in the two great modern sects worshipping Rudra-Çiva and Vishṇu. Thus, as above, Rudra and the Rakshasas are also associated in the rule: ‘When one repeats a text sacred to Rudra, to the Rakshasas, to the Manes, to the Asuras, or one that contains an imprecation, one shall touch water’ (Çāṅkh., *G.S.*, I, 10, 9). On the other hand, when the bridegroom leads the bride to take the seven steps, which form part of the wedding ceremony, he murmurs a blessing at every step: ‘One for sap, two for juice, three for prosperity, four for comfort, five for cattle, six for the seasons, Friend! be with seven steps (mine); be thou devoted to me.’ And after each clause he says ‘may Vishṇu lead thee.’ Similarly, the fact that Vaiçravaṇa (Kubera) and Īçāna (Rudra-Çiva) are worshipped ‘for the bridegroom’ point to the phallic nature of these cognate spirits (Pār., *G.S.*, I, 8, 2; Çāṅkh., *G.S.*, I, 11, 7).

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The Gṛihya Sūtras show that there was no one rite of universal acceptation in those ceremonies most intimately connected with domestic felicity. Indeed, the author of the Āçvalāyana Gṛihya Sūtra (I, 7, 1) says expressly that in the matter of weddings, ‘customs are diverse,’ and he gives only that which is common usage. Thus he tells how the bride is to go about the fire, mount the stone, pour out grain, gaze at the pole-star, etc., but does not mention other rites which other Gṛihya Sūtras enjoin. Some of these, however, are of universal interest; and a comparison of the Hindu ceremonies with those of other Āryan-speaking peoples shows that in all probability the Indian ritual has preserved elements reaching far back into prehistoric times¹.

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¹ On this point, cf. Haas and Weber, *Indische Studien*, vol. v; L. von Schroeder, *Die Hochzeitsgebräuche der Esten und einiger anderer finnisch-ugrischer Völkerschaften in Vergleichung mit denen der indogermanischen Völker* (1888); M. Winternitz, *Das altindische Hochzeitsrituell...mit Vergleichung der Hochzeitsgebräuche bei den übrigen indogermanischen Völkern* (1892); also a paper by the last writer on the same subject in the *Transactions of the National Folk-lore Society* (*Congress*, 1891–2), and one by Th. Zachariae, ‘*Zum altindischen Hochzeitsrituell*’ (*Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes*, vol. XVII, pp. 135 f., and 211 f.).

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Thus in the ceremony it is universal usage to walk the seven steps together and for the bridegroom to murmur, as he takes the bride's hand: 'This am I, that art thou, that art thou, this am I; Heaven am I and Earth art thou; the (feminine) Ṛich (Rigveda verse) art thou, the Sāman am I. Be thou devoted to me,' and to make the bride mount a stone as an emblem of firmness. But special rules are that women shall come to the bride's house and eat and drink brandy and dance four times; and that merry girls shall escort the bridegroom to the bride's house, and that he must do all the foolish (?) things they tell him to do (except when taboo is concerned). (Çāṅkh., *G.S.*, I, 12, 2.) Some measure of values may perhaps be obtained from the statement that the fee to the priest who performs the marriage-ceremony is a cow, given by the bridegroom, if the groom is of the same caste as the priest, but a village if the groom is 'royal,' Rājanya, that is a nobleman of 'kingly' order, and a horse if the groom is of the third estate (farmer, trader). Obviously the succeeding rule, which is not unique, countenances a sort of sale in that it adds: '(The bridegroom must give) to the one who has the daughter one hundred (cows) together with a chariot.' The same rule is found in the Dharma Sūtras (Āpastamba, II, 13, 12) with the explanation that the gift must be returned, as a sale is not allowed—which only points back to an earlier period when the sale of daughters was allowed.

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The distinction among the orders mentioned in the gifts above is only one of innumerable passages in which, as a matter of course and without thought of any other social order, the castes are named as priest, noble or warrior, and 'people,' the last term embracing all those 'reborn,' who are not priests or warriors or slaves. The slaves, Çūdras and lower orders, are recognised as part of the social structure. The name itself suggests that the Çūdras were originally a conquered people, as Karian became synonymous with slave at Athens. Yet the Çūdras were not Pariahs but members of the household, who took part in some of the domestic rites.

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The test of caste is not marriage alone but defilement by eating and touching what is unclean. In this regard the Sūtras show only the beginning of that formal theory of defilement which results in a pure man of the upper castes being defiled by the shadow of an impure man, and in the taboo of all contact with the impure. According to Gautama (*Dharma Sūtra*, XVII, 1 f.), a Brāhman may eat food given by any of the 'reborn' who are worthy members of their caste, and if in need of food to support life he may take food and other things even from a Çūdra. Food forbidden is that defiled naturally by hairs or insects falling into it and that touched by a woman during her courses, by a black bird (crow), or by a foot, etc., or given by an outcast, a woman of bad character, a person accursed, an hermaphrodite, a police-officer (*daṇḍika*), a carpenter, a miser, a jailer, a physician, a man who hunts without using the bow (i.e. a non-Āryan snarer of animals), a man who eats refuse or the food of a multitude, of an enemy, etc. The list continues with the taboo of food offered disrespectfully and of certain animals. Āpastamba (*Dharma S.*, I, 6, 18, 1 f.) allows the acceptance of gifts, including a house and land, even from an Ugra (low caste or mixed caste), though, like the later law-books, his code states that a priest may not eat in the house of anyone of the three orders (*varṇas*) below him; but he may eat the food of any other priest, and according to ‘some’ he may eat the food of people of any caste except Çūdras and even their food in times of distress. Forbidden by him is the food of an artisan, of people who let houses or land, a spy, an unauthorised hermit (Buddhist?), besides that of surgeon, usurer, and others. Caste is *varṇa* or *jāti*, ‘colour’ and ‘kin,’ the former embracing the latter, as a social order including clans or families. Even in the all-important matter of marriage, caste is not so important as family. The only test, when one seeks a wife, according to Çāṅkhāyana, is that of the family: ‘They ask the girl in marriage, reciting the clannames.’ The text of Āçvalāyana expressly mentions as a form of marriage that in which the bridegroom kills the relatives and rapes the weeping girl, evidently a form once countenanced as well as enumerated among possible forms; at any rate it bars out all examination of the bride’s social position. Indeed the marriage rules permit the marriage of a Çūdra woman, though as the last of four wives, with a member of the highest caste (e.g. Pār., *G.S.*, I, 4, 11), whose offspring, of course, being ‘mixed’ or impure, is not a member of the Āryan ‘reborn,’ but nevertheless is recognised legally. And what shall we say of those who are not ‘reborn’ although Āryans? The rule in this case is universal that, if priest, warrior, or member of the third estate fail to be ‘reborn in the Veda,’ i.e. if such a one is not duly initiated into his social order at the proper time, he loses his prerogatives and becomes an outcast: ‘No one should initiate such men, nor teach them, nor perform sacrifice for them, nor have intercourse with them,’ and further, ‘A person whose ancestors through three generations have been thus outcast is excluded from the sacrament of initiation and from being taught the Veda,’ that is, they become Vrātyas or entirely outcast persons with whom one may not even have intercourse unless they perform special rites¹.

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¹ See Pāraskara, *Gṛihya Sūtra*, II, 5, 40 f., and Weber, *Ind. Literaturgesch.* p. 73 f., Eng. trans., p. 67.

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In general the Gṛihya Sūtras may be said to be the later scholastic codification of rules, formulas, and rites long practised, concerned chiefly with the orderly progress of an individual ideal life, and incidentally with such ceremonies as naturally occur in such a life, that is, besides rites from babyhood to marriage, fixed moon-rites, etc., those concerned with building, holidays, burial, etc. That they are not of Vedic age in their present form, though in substance reverting in part to Brāhmaṇa beginnings, may be concluded from their obvious posteriority in respect of language and metre (where verses are cited) to the Brāhmaṇas, not to speak of earlier Vedic texts, as well as from the fact that several Sūtras emanate from districts scarcely known even by name to the Brāhmaṇas. The general order of arrangement in the Gṛihya Sūtras is one conditioned by the subject-matter, which is to reveal the whole duty of man as a householder. Most of them begin with the marriage and continue with the birth of a child, the ceremonies at conception and at various stages before birth, at the birth itself, at the naming of the child, when he sees the sun, when he is fed, when his hair is cut, when he becomes a student, and when he returns home from his Guru (tutor) and becomes a householder. Then the child, now grown to a man, marries and the circle begins again. Finally the rite for the burial is described. A few texts take up the round of life at another point, that where the student-life begins. This is the procedure in the case of some of the Black Yajurveda texts (for example, the Mānava and Kāṭhaka Sūtras), but it makes no difference where one begins; each Sūtra follows out the life to the end, and the general uniformity shows that, whatever be the minor discrepancies and divergences of opinion (of which the authors are themselves well aware), the Gṛihya Sūtras as a whole are based upon one model, and that, whether in the northern or southern districts, the lives of orthodox Āryans were governed by a remarkable conformity of ritual. It is not improbable that, as has been suggested by Professor Oldenberg, many of the rites prescribed as general rules were nothing more than formulas of secret magic owned at first by certain families and afterwards become universal property².

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² Compare the admirable discussion of the position of the Gṛihya Sūtras by Prof. Oldenberg in *S.B.E.* vol. XXX.

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The specimen given above will suffice to show the artless style of these didactic Sūtras. They have in fact no style save that attained by scrupulous brevity. In the following paragraphs we shall seek rather to illustrate certain phases of the Gṛihya Sūtras as indicative of religious and magical beliefs and of the social environment in which they were produced, or at least for which they were intended.

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We may begin with reverting to the cure of epilepsy already mentioned. In the course of childhood the boy may be attacked by the dog-demon (epilepsy). What is the father to do? The names of the canine demons have been mentioned above with a parallel passage containing more of the same sort. These are to be averted by a sort of honorific propitiation. They are lauded; but their objectionable behaviour in this special case is deprecated. The author of our Sūtra contents himself with this. But a rival author or two (Hiraṇyakeçin, *G.S.*, II, 2, 7, 1 f.; Āpastamba, *Gṛihya Sūtra*, VII, 18, 1) are not content with the method here advocated. According to them, the father must make a hole in the roof of the royal gaming-hall and pull the boy through it, lay him on his back on dice strewn about, and then, while a gong is sounded, recite the deprecatory words to the dog-demons and pour curds and salt over the boy. Several items of this recipe are of interest, the avoidance of the door, the use of salt and curds to frighten demons, the gong for the same purpose to be beaten on the south side of the hall. These may be said to be universal antidotes; peculiar is the use of the dice, which has no parallel in the similar situations offered by the Sūtra. Finally the fact that the father makes a hole in the roof of the gaming-hall shows that it is made of thatch (easily repaired) and leads to the question what sort of architecture is normally to be found implied in the Sūtras. The gaming-hall is the public gambling-place which a king is directed to build for the use of his subjects, and curiously enough, with the exception of the householder’s own dwelling, it is almost the only reference to edifices found in the Sūtras. On the other hand, all the dicta of the Sūtras show that such life as is depicted is supposed to be country life; the district and the village are the geographical entities. Cities are not ignored but are despised¹. Thus there are no ceremonies for urban life. But there is a rite for ploughing, when sacrifice is made to Açani (the thunder-bolt) and to Sītā (the furrow), as well as to other bucolic deities, Araḍā, Anaghā, etc., as to the greater bucolic gods, Parjanya and Indra and Bhaga, with similar offerings on the occasion of the 'furrow sacrifice,' the 'threshing-floor sacrifice,' when one sows, reaps, or takes in the harvest, all indicating that the life portrayed is that of the village agriculturist, who must even 'offer a sacrifice at mole-heaps to Ākhurāja, the king of moles' (Gobhila, *Gṛihya Sūtra*, iv, 4, 28 f.; *ibid.* 30 f.). So the constant injunctions to 'go out of the village,' to sacrifice at a place where four roads meet, or on a hill, etc., imply life in villages even for householders and scholars rather than in towns (Gobhila, iii, 5, 32–35).

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¹ Āpastamba, *Dharma Sūtra*, I, 32, 21, ‘let him avoid going into towns,’ and Baudhāyana, *Dharma Sūtra*, II, 3, 6, 33, ‘It is impossible for one to obtain salvation, who lives in a town, covered with dust.’

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Besides the introduction of evil spirits and bucolic divinities into the ritual of the domestic service, we find in the Sūtras for the first time the recognition of images of the gods, which must be implied by the regulations concerning the deities Īçāna, Mīḍhushī, and Jayanta ('lord,' 'bountiful one,' 'conqueror') as well as the 'lord of the field,' Kshetrapati, who are moved about and given water to drink (Āp., *G.S.*, vii, 19, 13; *ibid.* 20, 1–3 and 13).

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When a boy is initiated he is made to mount a stone with the adjuration to be 'firm as a stone' which elsewhere is confined to the bride, and is then given in charge to 'Kashaka (Kaçaka), Antaka, Aghora, Disease, Yama, Makha, Vaçinī, Earth and Vaiçvānara, Waters, Herbs, Trees, Heaven and Earth, Welfare, Glory, the All-gods, all the Bhūts, and all the gods' (Hiraṇyakeçin, *G.S.*, i, 2, 6, 5). In this list of demons and deities to whom the boy is given in charge, Vaçinī as the 'ruling goddess' is noticeable. She is probably the mother-goddess who despite all Vedic influence always was the chief spiritual village-power identified with Çiva's wife in various forms. Perhaps too the recognition (in a rite to procure increase of cattle) of a god described merely as 'He who has a thousand arms and is the protector of cowkeepers' (*Gaupatya*), may be a veiled allusion to Kṛishṇa-Vishṇu (Gobhila, iv, 5, 18).

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As the Gṛihya Sūtras in distinction from the Dharma are concerned with domestic superstitions, these may rightly be considered their peculiar contribution to the history of India. Of political and social life they contain almost nothing except as confined within the bounds of the family. The regular routine of the normal life contains a sufficiency of such superstitions, though the underlying reason for them is due in some cases more to mechanical adjustment to a supposed harmony than to spiritual fears. This is the case for example in the regulation that the initiation of the Brāhman, Kshatriya, and Vaiçya shall take place, respectively, in spring, summer, and autumn, in the eighth, eleventh, and twelfth years after conception, the respective seasons being supposed to represent the castes, as the years represent the metres regarded as peculiar to these castes. Deeper lies the origin of the following:—the rite to drive out of the bride the influence deadly to the husband and to convert it into an influence deadly to her possible paramour (Hir., *G.S.*, I, 7, 24, 1 f.); the prayer that the ‘weeping women’ (demons) and Vikeçī may not torment her, nor the Piçāchas of the womb, who devour flesh and bring death (*ibid.* 6, 19, 7); the scattering of rice and other grains on the heads of the newly wedded pair (*ibid.* 21, 6); and the corresponding rite according to which the husband ties barley about the wife’s head, here expressly ‘to have offspring’ (Āp., *G.S.*, VI, 14, 7). Naturally the conjugal relations offer a fruitful field for this sort of thing. Thus we have a rite to make a husband subject to his wife as well as to make her co-wives subject to her (*ibid.* III, 9, 5 f.) and another very peculiar rite, the object of which is to keep the wife faithful, in which she is regarded much as is the slave around whom, when suspected of estrangement, urine is poured from a horn to keep him magically at home (Hir., *G.S.*, I, 4, 14, 2).

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Another subject claiming the attention of the Sūtra-maker is the efficacy of amulets. These are tied upon the priests, as a sort of final expression of good-will, in the Āçvayuja rite. They are made of lac and herbs (Gobh., III, 8, 6). Minor superstitions abound. If one yawns, one must say, ‘May will and wisdom abide in me,’ evidently a phase of the popular belief that the soul may escape in a yawn or sneeze (Hir., *G.S.*, I, 5, 16, 2). Signs of ill-luck which must be averted by a sacred formula are found in the presence in the house of a dove, of bees, or an anthill, in the budding forth of a post, etc. (*ibid.* I, 5, 17, 5). The transmission of sin is illustrated by the dictum that if one touches a sacrificial post the faults committed at the sacrifice are incurred (*ibid.* 16, 16); also by the injunction that when one’s hair is cut a well-disposed person should gather it up and hide it away, as the well-disposed person (the mother, for example) thus ‘hides the sin in the hair,’ probably a refinement on the original notion of not losing one’s soul-strength at the hands of some ill-disposed person (*ibid.* I, 2, 9, 18; cf. Āçv., I, 17, 10, etc., where the formula is ‘for long life’). Whether the objection to certain trees as liable to cause eye-trouble, etc., is grounded in fact or fancy, causing the injunction to transplant them, may be questioned, but the original cause has been lost in the maze of superstition, which makes the Açvattha tree injurious on the east side of the house, the Plaksha on the south, the Nyagrodha on the west, and Udumbara on the north.

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Before speaking of the Dharma Sūtras in particular it will be necessary here to settle the question as to what is meant by the Āryan, so often mentioned in all the Sūtras. While not lacking in moral connotation, so that as a common adjective *ārya* meant noble in heart as well as in race, it is only in the democracy of religious philosophy that such a person as an Āryan slave or barbarian was conceivable. Practically Ārya was synonymous with 'reborn' and indicated a person of the three upper castes in good standing, antithetic to Çūdra and other low-caste or out-caste persons. Yavanas (Greeks) are the most esteemed of foreigners, but all Yavanas are regarded as sprung from Çūdra females and Kshatriya males. Gautama says that sundry authorities hold this view¹. Such rules as that given by Gautama (XII, 2) in the case of the violation of an Āryan woman by a Çūdra, when compared with Āpastamba, *Dh.S.*, II, 26, 20, and 27, 9, prove conclusively that Ārya is 'noble in race' as distinguished from the 'black colour' (*ibid.* I, 27, 11, with the preceding 'non-Āryans'). Mr Ketkar in his *History of Caste in India* (p. 82), is rather rash in stating that there was no racial discrepancy felt between Āryan and Dravidian. It is true that those who were out-caste were no longer called Āryans, but no Çūdra was ever regarded as Āryan, any more than he could be 'reborn.' Ārya indicated racial distinction from the times of the Rigveda onwards.

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¹ *Dh. Çāstra*, IV, 21 (erroneously rendered 'offspring of male Çūdras and female Kshatriyas' in *S.B.E.* vol. II, p. lvi). This passage referring to Yavanas is unique in the Sūtras. They are Bactrian and other Asiatic Greeks. See Chap. XXII, pp. 540–1.

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We have seen that the Gṛihya Sūtras practically recognise life only as lived in villages. In the Dharma Sūtras, as these are later and have to do with wider relations, the town (*pur*, *nagara*), appears as a larger unit, though how much larger it is not easy to say; and when we remember that *pur* is after all only a stronghold or fort, and *nagara* is anything larger than a village, we must be cautious of too ready belief in large cities. Everything indicates on the contrary that life was still chiefly that of small places and kings were only petty chieftains. There was not supposed to be any school or even studying done in town. The Dharma Sūtra of Gautama, regarded as the oldest of extant Dharma Sūtras, says expressly that one should not recite the holy texts at any time in a town; and it is assumed, as in the Gṛihya Sūtras, that such life as is described passes normally in villages. Even in the description of the royal residence (*v. inf.* p. 247), the hall has a thatched roof. The king still stands up *in propria persona* and hits a thief with a cudgel; and, if the king fails to strike, the 'guilt falls on the king' (Gaut., *Dh.S.*, XII, 43). The commentators, apparently aware of the incongruity in applying such a rule to the kings of their day, attempt to restrict its application as intended for specially evil thieves (of gold); but it is in fact a general rule even as late as Āpastamba (*Dh.S.*, I, 25, 4), who says: 'A thief shall loosen his hair and appear before the king carrying a cudgel on his shoulder. With that (cudgel) he (the king) shall smite him; if he dies his sin is expiated, but, if the king forgives him, the guilt falls on him who forgives; or he (the thief) may throw himself into a fire or die by starvation.' Thus the later author seeks to excuse the king (but not the thief).

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The Dharma Sūtras add to the data of social life material evidence which shows that there were recognised customs not approved in one part of the country but doubtfully admitted as good usage because locally approved in other parts. For, in discussing usage, Baudhāyana (*Dh.S.*, I, 1, 17 f.) expressly says that customs peculiar to the South are to eat in the company of an uninitiated person, in the company of one's wife, to eat stale food, and to marry the daughter of a maternal uncle or of a paternal aunt, while customs peculiar to the North are to deal in wool, to drink rum, to sell animals that have teeth in the upper and in the lower jaws, to follow the trade of arms, and to go to sea. He adds that to follow these practices except where they are considered right usage is to sin, but that for each practice the local rule is authoritative, though Gautama denies this¹. Baudhāyana also admits the doctrine that a priest who cannot support himself by the usual occupations of a Brāhman may take up arms and follow the profession of a warrior; though here again his opinion is opposed to that of the earlier Gautama, who argues that such an occupation on account of its cruelty is not fitted for a priest. Whether the Gautama here represented as opposed be the Gautama whose Sūtra has come down to us may be doubted, but the two passages show that caste-integrity was not regarded as essential, for no one could be a warrior and retain the mode of life deemed proper for a priest.

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¹ See Bühler, *S.B.E.* vol. II, p. xlix. The river Narmadā (Narbadā) is the boundary between North and South. 'Making voyages by sea' causes loss of caste (Baudh., *Dharma Sūtra*, II, 1, 2, 2).

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The geography of the Sūtras illustrates very forcibly the limited reach of interest at the same time that knowledge of a wider country was thoroughly disseminated. Kaliṅga on the eastern coast is even the subject of versification, ‘He sins in his feet who visits the Kaliṅgas,’ and one who travels to their country must perform a purificatory sacrifice; as must they who visit the Āraṭṭas (in the Punjab) or the Puṇḍras and Vaṅgas (in Bengal), while the inhabitants of the country lying about Multān, Surat, the Deccan, Mālwā, western Bengal, and Bihār are all declared by Baudhāyana to be of mixed origin; and (by implication) their customs are not to be followed. The ‘country of the Āryans’ embraces in fact only the narrow district between the Patiāla district in the Punjab and Bihār, and between the northern hills (Himālayas) and those of Mālwā; some even confine the definition of Āryāvarta (country of the Āryans) to the district between the Ganges and Jumna¹.

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¹ Baudh. I, 1, 2, 9 f. Baudhāyana may be the Kāṇva referred to (in the next paragraph) as an authority. He was probably himself a southerner of the eastern coast. Cf. Bühler, *S.B.E.* vol. XIV, p. xxxvi f.

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Constant references to the opinions of earlier authorities, indefinitely cited as ‘some,’ show that our extant Sūtras are but a moiety of the mass lost. Naturally the later authors know by name more authorities than do the earlier. Āpastamba discusses ‘those whose food may be eaten’ and cites a certain Kāṇva who declares that ‘who wishes may give’; then a Kautsa, whose opinion is that he who is holy (*puṇya*), may give; then Vārshyāyaṇi who says that ‘anybody may give,’ because, if it is a sinner and the sin remains with him, the receiver cannot suffer, but if it does not remain with him (the giver), then the giving acts as a purification (Āp., *Dh.S.*, I, 19, 3 f.). Again the same author discusses theft. Anyone who takes what belongs to another is a ‘thief’; so teach Kautsa, Hārīta, and Kāṇva; but Vārshyāyaṇi says that there are exceptions. ‘Seeds ripening in the pod and food for a draught-ox’ may be taken (without theft), though ‘to take too much’ is a sin. Hārīta’s opinion is that the owner’s permission must first be given (Āp., *Dh.S.*, I, 28, 5).

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These texts in any case are more or less erroneous transmitters of older law. Thus the Sūtra law for manslaughter or murder enjoins that one who has killed a warrior shall give for the expiation of his sin a bull and a thousand cows. To whom? The commentator (a priest) says that the passage means give to the priests (Āp., *Dh.S.*, I, 24, 1), whereas the corresponding rule in Baudhāyana (I, 10, 19, 1) says that the fine shall be given to the king;

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and in both passages the commentator explains that the 'expiation for sin' may mean 'to remove the enmity of the murdered man's relatives,' which latter explanation is historically the earlier and probably the true explanation, as it is a parallel to the law permitting compensation for murder as found among other Āryan nations¹.

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¹ Cf. Bühler's explanation, *S.B.E.*, vol. II, p. 78.

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Since, in distinction from the Gṛihya Sūtras, the Dharma Sūtras have to do with society rather than with family, it is here that we find the beginning of civil and criminal law, although legal punishments are still retained in part under the head of penance, and the conditions of inheritance, which depend on the family, are partly explained under domestic duties, for these include (as we have seen) the rite of marriage, apropos of which is first defined the family (*gotra*, *gens*) into which one may marry. The rule is that a man shall not give his daughter to one belonging to the same *gotra*, that is, having the same family name², or, in the case of priests, descended from the same Vedic seer, or to one related on the mother's side within six degrees. Then the rules for inheritance, assuming the meaning of the Sapiṇḍa as one within six degrees, make Sapiṇḍas the heirs after or in default of sons. The Sapiṇḍas here are males only. The widow is excluded, and the daughter (according to Āpastamba) inherits only in default of sons, teacher, or pupil, these, however, being recommended to employ the inheritance for the spiritual good of the deceased. Probably the general rule anticipates not the death of the owner but a division of property among the sons during his lifetime. The king inherits in default of the others named, and some say that among the sons only the eldest inherits. These rules are sufficiently vague, but local laws are also provided for in the additional rule: 'In some countries gold, (or) black cattle, (or) black produce of the earth (grain or iron?) is the share of the eldest' (Āp., *Dh.S.*, II, 14, 7). Then in regard to what the wife receives, the Sūtra leaves it doubtful whether the rule 'the share of the wife consists of her ornaments and wealth received from her relations, according to some (authorities),' is to be interpreted in such a manner that 'according to some' refers only to the last clause or to the whole.

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² Generally speaking we may say that exogamy is the rule, but epic literature records cases of marriage between near relations (cousins).

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What is obvious is that the whole matter of inheritance was as yet not regulated by any general state law. Different countries or districts of India have different laws; different authorities differ in regard to the interpretation of these laws; and, finally, different texts of Vedic authority contradict by inference the rule to be got from them. Thus because one Vedic text says 'Manu divided his wealth among his sons,' it is implied that there should be no preference shown to the eldest; but, on the other hand, another Vedic text says 'they distinguish the eldest by the heritage,' which countenances the preference shown to the eldest. Now this last point, despite the desire for conciseness, demands consideration at length, so the maker of the Sūtra takes it up, arguing that a mere statement of fact is not a rule. For example (he says), the dictum 'a learned priest and a he-goat are the most sensual beings' is a statement, but cannot be taken as a rule. Hence, he says, the statement 'they distinguish the eldest' is not a rule. But the question remains, why then should the other statement, 'Manu divided his wealth,' be regarded as a rule? The subject of inheritance is treated first by Baudhāyana under the head of impurity, where he says simply that Sapiṇḍas inherit in default of nearer relations, and Sakulyas (remoter relations) in default of Sapiṇḍas; but afterwards he adds that the eldest son, in accordance with the quotations cited by Āpastamba, may receive the best chattel, or the father may divide equally among his sons. Here also the fact that the same subject is treated in different sections shows that as yet the matter of civil law was not treated systematically but incidentally.

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It is no part of the present discussion to enter into the confusing details of the laws of inheritance; only to show in what state were these laws at the time of the Sūtras. The latest Sūtra, however, already stands on a level with the formal law-books, and, for example in this matter of inheritance, is not content with the vague 'sons' of the earlier authors but makes a formal classification of the (later legal) 'twelve sons,' six of whom are entitled to inherit as 'heirs and kinsmen' while six (kinds) are 'kinsmen but not heirs,' among the last being the son of a Çūdra wife.

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Civil law is in general discussed in the Sūtras under the head of royal duties; for it is assumed that the king administers justice both civil and criminal. It is his part to pay attention to the special laws of districts, castes (*jāti*), and families, and make the four orders (*varṇas*, castes in a general sense) fulfil their duties. The summary, in the following order, includes punishing those who wander from the path of duty, not injuring trees that bear fruit, guarding against falsification of weights and measures, not taking for his own use the property of his subjects (except as taxes), providing for the widows of his soldiers, exempting from taxation a learned priest, a royal servant, those without protectors, ascetics, infants, very old men, students, widows who have returned to their families, unmarried girls, wives of servants, and *pradattās* (doubtful, perhaps girls promised in marriage); but first and foremost, the king is to protect all in his realm (Vasishṭha, xix, 1–24). This quaint summary of royal duties does not even belong to the early Sūtra period but derives from a text, which in some regards is practically, as it is called, a law-book (Çāstra). It reflects, as do the elaboration of details and additions casually made, the fact that even at this comparatively late period the king was still a small local rāja, not an emperor.

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