Pre-Buddhist India: A Political, Administrative, Economic, Social and Geographical Survey of Ancient India Based Mainly on the Jataka Stories c5.t1: II. Labour

Pre-Buddhist India: A Political, Administrative, Economic, Social and Geographical Survey of Ancient India Based Mainly on the Jātaka Stories c5.t1

Language: English

II. Labour

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During the foregoing discussion on the production of wealth, we have already dealt with one of its factors, *viz.*, land. Let us now speak something about the remaining ones.

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We take up labour. While considering this aspect of production we have to deal with a variety of details, as for instance, the extent, efficiency, and the nature of labour.

We have indeed no statistical knowledge as regards the total population of the country at that time. But if we can be allowed to take the figure 60000 as the total number of villages,¹ and 2500 as the population of a single average village of 500 families,² (taking a family as consisting of five members) both of which we dare not take as reliable, nor even plausible, then we get, on calculation, 15 crores as the total population of India. Whatever it may have been, it seems clear that there was no dread of a growing population. People on the contrary yearned for children, and there was scope for an unlimited increase in population, owing to the vast areas of virgin soil available for occupation and cultivation.

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¹ J., V, p. 258-G. 41 "*saṭṭhigāmasahassāni*."

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² J., V, p. 71—"*pañcakulasatāni*."

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We do not know how far the health and strength of the people went to secure productive efficiency. The majority of the people were dependent upon agriculture, as seen above, and the artisans and craftsmen do not seem to have had any effective demand either, as their products were used only by the royalty and the high class people. The large mass of the people, therefore, had very little of a nourishing dietary. They generally lived upon rice (*yāgu*), cakes (*pūva*) and some kind of curry, buttermilk and perhaps fish, while dainty rice-porridge (*pāyāsa*) and meat and other nutritious condiments were the privilege of the rich few.³ Apart from this, however, the open-air work of the peasants and other labourers did maintain their general health and strength.

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³ For instance, J., IV, p. 379; V, pp. 211, pp. 384-5; 441 "*asambhinnakhīrasappimad-husakkharayutto pāyāso....tam te daliddatāya uppādetum na sakkonti*"

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The general tendency of the people was, it is true, to follow the same vocation which their fathers had adopted.⁴ Not only individuals, but families are often spoken of in terms of their traditional calling. We have, for instance, such expressions as the "family of caravan-drivers" (*satthavāhakulam*),⁵ "grain-merchants' family" (*dhañña-vāṇijakulam*),⁶ "green-grocer's family" (*paṇṇikakulam*),⁷ or the "potters' family" (*kumbhakārakulam*);⁸ and in these instances, the son takes up his father's calling; the *satthavāhaputta* is a *satthavāha* himself and the potter's son is a potter himself.⁹ But, inspite of this tendency, nothing prevented a person of one occupation finding his way into another, if he so chose to do. There was complete freedom of initiative. A few instances of this freedom and mobility may be cited. A low class deer-trapper (*migaluddako*) becomes first a protégé and then the inseparable friend of a rich young seṭṭhi.¹ A pious farmer and his son, without much ado, turned to rush-weaving.² Similarly a young man of good family, but of reduced circumstances (duggata kulaputta), starting on his career by selling a dead mouse for cat’s meat at a farthing, then turning his capital and labour to every variety of job, finally bought up a ship’s cargo with his signet-ring pledged as security, and won both a profit of 200 per cent and the hand of the Seṭṭhi’s daughter.³ We have also an instance of the whole village of wood-workers being removed and located in another place,⁴ without even a hint of social barriers. Thus the mobility of labour, both from place to place and occupation to occupation, was rendered largely independent of status.⁵ Still we cannot forget that hereditary tendency was a prominent factor in the economic life of those days.

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⁴ See for instance, J., I, pp. 98; 107; 120; 122, 283, 284; II, pp. 64, 236; III, p. 200, IV, p. 62.

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⁵ J., I, pp. 98, 107, 194, 312; II, pp. 79.

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⁶ J., III, p. 198.

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⁷ J., I, p. 312.

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⁸ J., II, p. 79; III, p. 376.

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⁹ Cf. also *nesāda-luddaputto-luddo*, III, pp. 330 *ff*; V, pp. 356-8.

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¹ J., III, p. 48, ff.

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² J., IV, p. 318.

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³ J., I, pp. 120 ff.

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⁴ J., IV, p. 150.

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⁵ See J., VI, p. 214-G. 929-30. “As householders (ibbhā), to gain livelihood, count all pursuits legitimate and good.”
6. J., I, p. 121; V, p. 290.

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It is questionable whether, in spite of that hereditary skill in the workmanship, the people ever applied themselves to work seriously and with a view to improve their craft. It cannot be said with any certainty that the workman had the incentive, the impetus and enthusiasm for his work. Perhaps the few who were in the service of the ruling princes and the great lords, like the rājakumbhakāra,⁶ the rāja-mālākāra,⁷ the rājupaṭṭhāka nalakāra,⁸ or the tailor in the employ of a merchant, had some incentive to develop their craft.⁹ But Fick says: “the designation of these as court-purveyors seems to me to refer to a special position which raises them above their otherwise low or even despised rank.”¹⁰ This low appreciation of the dignity of labour, of which we have many instances in the class of hīnasippas or the despised arts,¹¹ must have been a great drawback in the output of a good and efficient work, if it were not for the organizations which some of them were fortunate enough to possess.

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⁷ J., V, p. 292.

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⁸ J., V, p. 291.

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⁹ J., IV, p. 24.
10. op. cit., p.

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¹¹ Cf. Fick, op. cit., pp. 315 ff.

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It is of course needless for us to dwell on the character of labour as productive or unproductive. The large number of parasitical professions which existed in our Jātaka-society, as discussed above, show that a considerable portion of labour was clearly unproductive, though there is no such condemnation of labour in the stories themselves. But still the distinction between “high” (Ukkaṭṭha) and “low” (hīna) labour was recognized. All these workers, the hunters and the fishermen, the wood-workers and the potters, the barbers and the sweepers come under the category of "low" classes. Through their professional work they fell into contempt.¹

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²⁸⁷ Individual craftsmen depending upon rich employers is a feudal trait. Cf. Marshall—“In Palermo there is a semi-feudal connection between artisans and their patrons, each carpenter or tailor has one or more large houses to which he looks for employment. And so long as he behaves himself fairly well, he is practically secure from competition.” Principles of Economics, I, p. 688, note.

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¹ Cf. Fick, op. cit., pp. 322 ff.

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For the most part, it seems, each workman was a separate unit and had to find his own raw material and sell the finished product of his labour, thus combining the labourer and the trader in himself. Thus the workman, as in medieval Europe, "was primarily a trader, his success depended as much on his shrewdness in trade as on his skill in industry."² The class of middlemen was therefore not known, except in some towns and cities where inland and foreign trade was carried on an extensive scale.

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² Cf. Seligman, *Economics*, p. 78, quoted by Subbarao, op. cit., p. 76.

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But this was true only in the case of those ordinary agricultural people with a little piece of land at their disposal and in the petty manufacturers or artisans, who did not require any added labour.

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There was still, mostly in towns and cities, the regular serving class, composed of all possible elements of the population differing in point of race and professional work. To this class belonged the hired-labourers and the slaves (*Dāsa-kammakaras*) who laboured for others in return of some payment (*bhataka*), whether in kind or in money.³ Let us first take up the hirelings or the wage-earners (*kammakaras: bhatakas*).

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³ J., II, p. 139; III, pp. 129, 257; 326; 444; IV, pp. 50, 320; V, pp. 212; 293; VI, p. 360. Cf. Rock Edict, IX, *Dāsa-bhatakasi samyapatipati*; *Arthaśāstra*, III, 13, 14; *Dīgha. Nikāya*, III, 190-1; *Ācārāngasūtra*, I, 2 5, 1.

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The nature of the work is not always specified. We read of a poor *gahapati* who supports himself and his mother by working for hire (*bhatim katvā*).⁴ In another instance, a young man, similarly, worked as a hired labourer.⁵ Not only men, but women also, old and young, used to get their living by working for hire.⁶ Of the specified labourer, we have mention of the workers on the farms. Every big land-owner, like the one in the *Sālikedāra Jātaka*,⁷ kept a number of day-labourers in his service. These farm-workers laboured from morning till evening.⁸ Some other workers used to live by carrying water (*udakabhatim katvā*).⁹ Similarly there must have been labourers in the service of every rich tradesman or manufacturer. The *bhatakas* of the *Sālikedāra Jātaka* were held responsible for any damage caused by their neglect.¹⁰

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⁴ J., III, p. 325.

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⁵ J., II, p. 139.

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⁶ J., I, pp. 111, 475 (*paresam bhatim katvā kiccheva jīvanti*); III, p. 446.

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⁷ J., IV, p. 277.

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⁸ J., III, p. 445; IV, p. 114.

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⁹ J., III, p. 446; *takkabhatim*: curd-selling?

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¹⁰ J., IV, p. 277.

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The majority of the working class plied on their profession of a labourer without ever aspiring to a higher state. This profession of a hired labourer, as that of the slave, was as much hereditary as any other occupation. The Bodhisatta, reborn in a poor family (*daliddakulam*), works, when he is grown up, for hire at a *Seṭṭhi's*.¹

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¹ J., III, pp. 406, 444.

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What was the position of these hired labourers? It was not at all enviable. The agricultural labourer received the customary wages and many times in kind²—an usual phenomenon even to this day. And as to an ordinary labourer, too, he could not earn more than a *māsaka* or even half a *māsaka*, and in almost all instances of a hired-labourer, it is invariably mentioned that the wages he got were hardly sufficient for his maintenance.³ With such a low wage, it was simply impossible for the ordinary worker to raise himself to a higher position. "Born and bred in poverty, he bore his sad lot as a nature-necessity in order to leave it to his children as a legacy."⁴ Perhaps, the cause of this cheapness of labour and low wages is to be found in the proverbial poverty of the people and also, to a certain extent, in the want of efficient organization of labour in ordinary life. The ideal was that "a man should always work for his interest in whose house he is fed."⁵

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² *Kālānurūpam*, as Kauṭilya would say—"Wages being previously unsettled, a cultivator shall obtain 1/10th of the crops grown...." *Arthaśāstra*, III, 13.

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³ J., I, p. 475; III, pp. 325, 446.

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⁴ Fick, op. cit., p. 304.

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⁵ J., VI, pp. 426-G. 1485—"*Yasseva ghare bhuñjeyya bhogaṃ tasseva atthaṃ puriso careyya*."

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The day-labourers were, perhaps, taken care of in the house of their master, though they did not live there but returned to their own lodgings in the evening.⁶ These houses, like the residencies of the poor (*duggatā*), were, most probably, outside the town or the city. The water-carrier, for instance, of the *Gaṅgamāla Jātaka*,⁷ lived with a poor woman who likewise maintained herself by carrying water, at the northern gate of Benares.

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⁶ J., III, p. 445—"*sabbe attano attano vasanaṭṭhānāni gatā*."

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⁷ J., III, p. 446.

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Thus the position of the hired workers was anything but happy. But they still enjoyed a certain freedom, if not happy living, in comparison with the slaves (*dāsā*) about whom we now will speak something.

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Slavery was quite common in those days. "The slave or servant was an adjunct in all households able to command domestic service."⁸ Both male and female slaves—*dāsa* and *dāsī*—flitter across the pages of the *Jātaka* stories They were, for the most part, household or domestic servants,⁹ who resided in the family of the master and performed all sorts of household duties.

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⁸ C. H. I., I, p. 205. Kauṭilya has a whole chapter on slavery: *Dāsakalpa*: *Arthaśāstra*, III, 13.

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⁹ J., I, pp. 200, 225, 350 etc.

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Four kinds of slaves are specifically mentioned: "Some are slaves from their mothers (*āmayadāsā*), others are slaves driven by fear (*bhayapaṇunnā*); some come of their own will as slaves (*sayam upayānti*), others are slaves bought for money (*dhanena kītā*)."¹⁰ All these and some more types of slaves are represented in our stories. Children of the slaves generally took, or perhaps had to take, the same profession in life.¹ Biraṇī of the *Nimi Jātaka* was a home-born slave (*āmāyadāsi*).² So was the fraudulent Kaṭāhaka.³ References to slaves bought for money are numerous.⁴ A Brāhmaṇa is sent by his careless and sinful wife, who pretends to be unable to do household work, to beg money wherewith to purchase her a female slave. The Brāhmaṇa begs 700 *Kahāpaṇas*, a sum which he considers sufficient for buying a male or a female slave,⁵ while in the *Vessantara Jātaka*, the high-born prince was sold for 1000 *paṇas*.⁶ Probably the price varied with the accomplishment of slaves. In the *Khaṇḍahāla Jātaka* we have a suggestive reference to persons becoming slaves voluntarily and out of fear.⁷ It also appears that captives and prisoners of war or raids also could be, and were, enslaved. We read, for instance, of some borderers raiding the country-side. It is there said that "having assailed a town, and taken prisoners, laden with spoil they returned to the border. Amongst the prisoners was a beautiful maiden who thought to herself: 'these men, when they have carried us off home, will use us as slaves; I must find some way to escape.'"⁸ In another story we hear of fear entertained for some captured kings who might be enslaved or brought to the border country and sold out as slaves.⁹ Slaves, especially female, are also mentioned as given away by way of gifts (*dānam*).¹⁰ We have instances of persons being deprived of their freedom as a judicial punishment and reduced to slavery. The village superintendent of the *Kulāvaka Jātaka*, for instance, who has slandered the villagers before the king, is condemned to lose not only his property but also his freedom: the king makes him the slave of the village people.¹¹ Elsewhere we read of ministers, condemned to death by the king for outright jealousy, being given away as slaves.¹² To the category of slaves belonged also the *paricārakās* and messengers (*pesse*) who were dependent upon their masters.¹³ The institution of slavery was so common that not only kings and wealthy people but the Brāhmaṇas and simple villagers and farmers also kept slaves in their families.¹⁴

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¹⁰ J., VI, p. 285—G. 1238. The Law enumerates 7 kinds of slaves: See *Manu*, VIII, 415, all of which are represented in our stories. *Cf.* also *Vinaya Piṭaka*, I, 2, 1.

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¹ J., I, pp. 225; 451; III, pp. 409, 444.

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² J., VI, p. 117.

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³ J., I, p. 452.

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⁴ J., I, p. 200.

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⁵ J., III, p. 343.

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⁶ J., VI, p. 577; see also *ibid.*, p. 523.

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⁷ J., VI, p. 135-G. 588 Subbarao remarks: "Some became slaves of free will. Among these there were, no doubt, persons who were mortgaged by their relatives in satisfaction of a debt." op. cit., p. 10.

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⁸ J., VI, p. 220—"Dāsibhogena bhuñjissanti."

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⁹ J., V, p. 497.

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¹⁰ J., VI, pp. 462-G. 1630; 464-G. 1638; 503-G. 1841.

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¹¹ J., I, p. 200; also p. 241.

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¹² J., VI, p. 389—"dāse katvā adāsi."

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¹³ J., IV, pp. 320-G. 110; 362-G. 231.

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¹⁴ J., II, p. 428; III, pp. 101, 162-3; V, p. 105; VI, p. 117.

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The treatment of the slaves was, generally speaking, humane and considerate. It, however, depended on, and differed according to, the temperament and capacity of both the master and the slave. There is complete absence of legal rights of the slaves in the stories. The right of the master over his slave seems, according to the prevailing custom, to have been absolute (*ayiro hi dāsassa janinda issaro*).¹

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¹ J., VI, p. 300-G. 1317.

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About the family of a Brāhmaṇa agriculturist, the *Uraga Jātaka* says: "With a female slave they composed a household of six, the Bodhisatta (Brāhmaṇa) and his wife, the son and daughter, the daughter-in-law and the female slave. They lived happily and affectionately together."² Thus the female slave was not considered as a different or outside person but one of the members of the household. A similar familiar relationship between the master and his female slave is pointed out in another *Jātaka* also.³ The family-priest, whom the king asks to demand a boon, consults, besides the members of his family, also the slave Puṇṇā, what her desire is. And the slave-girl, humble as she is, desires a mortar, a pestle and a sieve.⁴ Prince Sutasoma is courteous enough to accept the words of his slave with due honour.⁵ Sometimes the slaves were permitted to learn reading and writing and handicrafts along with the sons of their masters.⁶ We also find that the slaves often enjoyed their master's confidence, and sometimes were even appointed as store-keepers or guards of the property of their masters.⁷

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² J., III, p. 162.

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³ J., II, p. 428.

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⁴ Ibid.

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⁵ J., V, pp. 485-G 415.

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⁶ J., I, p. 451.

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⁷ Ibid., I, p. 225.

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But all these are instances which reflect the mentality of the master who gives better treatment to his slaves as if only in charity. We may not be justified in our inference from the above-cited examples that the position of the slaves was happy and favourable. Nor can we be fully certain about their real position. For there are other instances which clearly speak of the miserable lot of these classes. The happiness and sufferings of the slave were linked up with those of his master: his weal and woe depended upon him, as the learned *Paṇḍita* Vidhura testifies himself.⁸ Kaṭāhaka, who was appointed a store-keeper could not command any confidence in himself. He is constantly in fear of losing his higher status. He reflects: "I shall not always be kept at this work. The slightest fault, and I shall be beaten, imprisoned, branded, and fed on slave's fare."⁹ In another place, a female slave is thrown down at the door of the house and beaten with rope-ends by her master and mistress, because she could not bring home her wages.¹⁰ The pretty little girl Kaṇhā laments her unfortunate condition before her father: "As though I were a home-born slave, this Brahmin thrashes me."¹¹ These similies do indeed reflect the reality. Such is also the simile "like slave before his lord," given to show that repetition of pitiful words is not dignified.¹²

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⁸ J., VI, p. 285-G. 1238.

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⁹ J., I, p. 451.

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¹⁰ J., I, p. 402.

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¹¹ J., VI, p. 554-G. 2109—"latthiyā paṭikoteti ghare gataṃ va dāsiyam".

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¹² J., V, p. 257-G. 34—dāso ayirassa santike; Dāsiputta is a word of reproach: J., I, p. 225; IV, p. 41.

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Slaves could be rightfully given away to another.¹ We have two instances of run-away slaves who were seeking opportunity to free themselves from the clutches of their masters.² We cannot say with any certainty whether the master had any right over the person of a female slave, though it was not impossible in that age.³ Slaves could regain freedom on payment⁴ or through voluntary manumission by the master.⁵

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¹ J., VI, pp. 285-G. 1239; 575-G. 2343.

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² J., I, pp. 452, 458.

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³ See N. C. Banerji in *Calcutta Review*, Aug. 1930, pp. 254-5

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⁴ J., VI, p. 547-G. 'Bhujissa'—a freed slave.

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⁵ J., V, p. 313.

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The work which the slaves had to do was of course manifold. The slave was ordinarily engaged in cooking,⁶ fetching water,⁷ pounding and drying rice,⁸ carrying food to, and watching, the field,⁹ giving alms¹⁰ ministering to the master when he retired,¹¹ or handing the plates and dishes, bringing the spitton and fetching the fans during meals,¹² sweeping the yards and stables¹³ and such other duties.

Cites (7)

Jātakatthavaṇṇanā — Pāli
Kauṭilīya Arthaśāstra — Kauṭilya, Sanskrit
Mānava Dharmaśāstra — Manu & Bhṛgu, Sanskrit
Dīghanikāya — Pāli
Jātaka — Pāli
Āyāraṃga — Sudharman, Ardhamāgadhī Prakrit
Vinayapiṭaka — Pāli