Tribes in Ancient India c11.2

c11.2

The Madras¹ were an ancient Kṣatriya tribe of Vedic times. They are not mentioned in the early Vedic Saṃhitās, but the Vamśa Brāhmaṇa of the Sāmaveda mentions an ancient Vedic teacher, Madragāra Śauṅgāyani, from whom Aupamanyava, the Kāmbojan, received the Vedic lore (cf. chapter on Kāmbojas). From the name Madragāra, scholars infer that Śauṅgāyani belonged to the Madra tribe,² and the fact that Vedic learning had spread so much among the Madras as to give one of them a prominent place in a list of ancient teachers would seem to show that the Madras belonged to the Vedic Aryandom before the age of the Brāhmaṇas. Their Vedic learning in Brāhmaṇa times is testified to by the Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa where we find that sages of N. India, most probably of the Kuru-Pañcāla district, repaired to the Madra country to receive their education in Vedic learning. In the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad (III, 7, 1), Uddālaka Āruṇi tells Yājñavalkya: ‘We dwelt among the Madras in the houses of Patañcala Kāpya, studying the sacrifice’. And again, Bhujyu Lāhāyani says, ‘We wandered about as students, and came to the house of Patañcala Kāpya’ (Bṛh. Up., III, 3, 1).