The Social Organisation in North-East India in Buddha's Time c15.18

c15.18

Just as his social rank¹ was hereditary, so also the office (seṭṭhitthâna) of the father passed as a rule on to the son (I. 231, 248; III. 475). Reborn in a seṭṭhi family, the Bodhisatta when he is grown up, sets up a household and obtains after the death of his father the position of a “representative of the commercial community” (seṭṭhikule nibbattitvā vayappatto kuṭumbaṃ saṇṭhāpetvā pitu accayena seṭṭhitthānaṃ patvā IV. 62).