History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v4.c63.423

v4.c63.423

⁵⁹¹ In Beal's 'Buddhist Records of the Western world,' vol. I. p. 84 (also Watters on Yuan Chwang's travels vol. I. p. 172) four kinds of ordeals are mentioned as in vogue, viz. by water, fire, weight and poison. In the water ordeal the accused is placed in a sack connected with a stone vessel and thrown into deep water. If the man sinks and the stone floats he is guilty; if the man floats and the stone sinks then he is pronounced innocent. The ordeal by fire is: they heat a plate of iron and make the accused sit on it and again place his feet on it and apply it to the palms of his hands; moreover he is made to pass his tongue over it. If no scar results he is innocent; if there are scars his guilt is proved. In the ordeal by weight a man and a stone are placed evenly in a balance. If the accused is innocent the stone rises in the balance; if he is guilty the man rises and the stone falls. In the ordeal of poison an incision is made in the right thigh of a ram, all sorts of poison with a portion of the food of the accused are placed in the incised wound. If the man is guilty poison takes effect and the animal dies; if he is innocent the poison has no effect and the animal survives. It will be noticed that these descriptions of the four ordeals do not agree in several respects with the descriptions in the smṛtis and digests, while the poison ordeal in Beal has nothing in common with the smṛti poison ordeal. Alberuni (tr. by Sachau, vol. II. pp. 159-160) probably speaks of poison ordeal in the words 'the accused person is invited to drink *bish* called brāhmaṇa' (he is probably referring to poison being called the offspring of Brahmā in Yāj. II. 110 and Nār. IV. 325). In the ordeal of water the accused is simply thrown into a deep and rapidly flowing river or a deep well and he was held innocent if he was not drowned. He describes the *kośa* ordeal and balance ordeal accurately, but states that if the man has spoken the truth he weighs more than before. He describes correctly *taptamāṣa* (gold piece taken from boiling clarified butter) and also the ordeal of the red-hot iron piece.