The Social Organisation in North-East India in Buddha's Time c10.24

c10.24

supreme position in Indian society" and that it represents the transition period in which the Brahmanical claim to pre-eminence, although advanced with great arrogance, was not universally recognised, at least not from the side of the Khattiyas. If this is true, then the Brâhmaṇa texts which assert the superiority of the priestly classes as an indisputable fact represent a later stage of evolution of Indian culture, which assumption will not, however, do. The difference between the account in the Pali texts and that in the Brahmanical ones lies partly in the real balance of power which in the east was never on the side of the priestly class and partly in the subjective bias of the Buddhistic authors, on the one hand who oppose Brahmanism and that of the Brâhmaṇas, on the other, who worship their caste inordinately.