The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c23.14

v1.c23.14

We have already seen that the four castes are regarded as the frame of social life, and that the young student, after spending several years with a priestly preceptor, the length of time depending partly on caste and partly on aptitude, marries and becomes a householder, with numerous religious duties to perform. Twelve years of study is regarded as the minimum, forty-eight years as enough even for the most studious priest. Megasthenes tells us that the Hindus studied for nearly this length of time, but it is clear that only priests practised such zeal. The epic warriors are supposed to have finished their education by their sixteenth year, and the fact that a few words of a hymn are admitted as substitution for this part of the education (consisting in memorising verses) shows that for practical purposes a smattering of Veda was deemed enough in the case of all except the priest. The early law-books devote no little space to the early youth and conduct in later life of the orthodox Āryan. Manu, for example, gives six of his twelve books to rules of life before he comes to discuss royal life and legal matters. Noteworthy is the early date at which a man retires from practical life. As the youth marries early, in the warrior caste as early as sixteen, though Manu recognises twenty-four or thirty as the usual (priestly?) age, it may happen that he becomes a grandfather before he is forty, by which time, to be sure, the Hindu is often grey. Now it is expressly said that when a man becomes grey and a grandfather he is to enter the third *āçrama* or stage of life and become a hermit, either accompanied with his wife or not, as he chooses. Severe asceticism marks this period of life (it is described in full by Manu, Book VI), and probably it was reserved generally for the priestly caste; some law-givers omit it. It is likely that instead of this stage many priests became mendicants. The act of renouncing the world is introduced by a sacrifice of worldly goods and other ceremonies prescribed by the Sūtras and law-books. But the latter, in distinction from the former, if indeed they devote much time to such matters at all, now turn to that part of Dharma or Right which is included under the head of Royalty and Vyavahāra. The latter term means law in the modern sense, business intercourse legally interpreted, legal procedure. There is no formal distinction between civil and criminal law till the term *vyavahāra* is divided by later writers into ‘cases of property’ and ‘cases of hurt.’ The first enumeration of legal titles is found in Manu and is as follows: (1) Recovery of debts; (2) Deposits and pledges; (3) Sale without ownership; (4) Partnership; (5) Resumption of gifts; (6) Non-payment of wages; (7) Breach of contract; (8) Annulling of sale and purchase; (9) Disputes between the owner and tender of cattle; (10) Disputes regarding boundaries; (11) Assault; (12) Defamation; (13) Theft; (14) Robbery (with violence); (15) Adultery; (16) Duties of man and wife; (17) Partition (inheritance); (18) Gambling (with dice) and betting (on cock-fights, etc.). In this category, criminal law is represented by the titles eleven to fifteen and eighteen, while the first nine and the sixteenth and seventeenth titles belong to civil law. There is also no distinction between laws affecting things and persons, and, to follow the indictment of Mill in his *History of India*, ‘Non-payment of wages stands immediately before breach of contract, as a separate title, though it ought to be included under that head.’ But the eighteen titles are remarkable as the first attempt to separate different cases; to demand that Manu should have given us a perfect or even a perfectly clear list is unreasonable.