The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c23.15

v1.c23.15

The titles and the arrangement of Manu are followed by later writers, though with sub-divisions. Thus Bṛihaspati (II, 8), after giving the eighteen titles says that they 'are divided owing to diversity of lawsuits'; and other writers give ten chief crimes (killing a woman, mixture of caste, adultery, robbery, causing illegitimate birth, abuse, insults, assault, procuring abortion) headed by disobedience of the king's commands. It is, too, only later writers who assert that a lawsuit cannot be instituted mutually between father and son, or man and wife, or master and servant (Nārada, I, 6). Although the titles begin with civil cases, there is no doubt that primitive procedure had to do with criminal cases before civil cases were known. Thus the earliest trials are for theft and perjury, and it is probable that theft was the first crime to be recognised legally. We have seen that even in the Sūtras the thief is brought before the king and punished by him, and theft is the chief crime mentioned in the Vedas (more particularly theft of cattle, or robbery). There are a thousand forms of theft, according to Bṛihaspati, who makes theft one of the kinds of 'violence,' of which there are four—homicide, theft, assault on another's wife, and injury (either abuse or assault). Thieves are of two sorts, open and concealed, 'and these are sub-divided a thousandfold, according to their skill, ability, and mode of cheating' (Bṛih., XXII, 2). Those who cheat at dice or cheat a corporation are to be punished as impostors. The punishment for breaking into a house to steal is impalement; highwaymen are hanged from a tree by the neck; kidnappers are burned in a fire of straw; one who steals a cow has his nose cut off; for stealing more than ten measures of grain the thief is executed; for less he is fined eleven times what he has stolen (*ibid.* 9 f.; Manu, VIII, 320). The proof of theft is possession of the stolen property, or a track leading to the house of the suspected man; but excessive expenditure, intercourse with sinners, and other 'signs' may make a man suspected; then he may have to clear himself by oath or ordeal.