History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v3.c45.59

v3.c45.59

From the account of the death of Kalanos the Indian gymnosophist at 73 given by Megasthenes (Mc Crindle p. 106) we can gather that the practice of religious suicide prevailed long before the 4th century B. C. Strabo (XV. 1. 4) states that with the ambassadors that came to Augustus Cæsar from India also arrived an Indian gymnosophist who committed himself to the flames like Kalanos who exhibited the same spectacle before Alexander.