Hindu Law and Custom (Recht und Sitte) c9.105

c9.105

§ 44. *The blood-money.* However closely the penal laws of the Smṛtis may agree with the principle of state justice, yet traces of a state of things have been preserved when the atonement for murder and slaughter was still regarded as a private affair and when the blood-money used to be paid³. Roth has referred to the Vedic expressions *śatadāya* and *vairadeya* and has proved that in the Vedic age a blood-money of 100 cows was paid to the relations of a murdered person. Baudh. 1,19,¹ prescribes fines of 1000, 100 and 10 cows and a bull to be paid to the king for the murder of a Kṣatriya, a Vaiśya and a Śūdra respectively. Generally the same indemnity has to be paid for the murder of a woman as for the murder of a Śūdra as well as for an ox or a cow (excepting milchcows, draughts animals) and also for a swan, a peacock and other birds and animals. As Bühler ingeniously suggests, probably the king did not keep these fines for himself, but gave them to the family of the murdered person. The blood-money of 100 cows reminds us of the 100 cows which have to be given as price for an adoptive son or as the price for a bride.