Tribes in Ancient India c51.59

c51.59

The Jātaka stories often make extravagant demands upon popular credence, as when they relate how the average length of human life at the time of the Buddha Gautama was thirty thousand years. More fortunate than the average mortal, King Makhādeva of Mithilā had a lease of life of eighty-four thousand years,⁶ in the earlier portion of which he amused himself as a royal prince. Later on, he was appointed a Viceroy, and last of all became king. We come to a more sober estimate when we find it related that there lived in Mithilā a Brāhman named Brahmāyu, aged one hundred and twenty years, who was well versed in the Vedas, Itihāsas, Vyākaraṇa, Lokāyata, and was endowed with all the marks of a great man.⁷