Pre-Buddhist India: A Political, Administrative, Economic, Social and Geographical Survey of Ancient India Based Mainly on the Jataka Stories c5.t3.113

c5.t3.113

Though the stories often speak of persons of colossal wealth like the *Setthis* or the rich Brāhmaṇas, we will not be justified in holding, in general, that there existed startling inequalities in private property as they exist today. The extraordinary opulence of the kings, the *Setthis* or the rich Brāhmaṇas, was, perhaps, an exception, if not an imaginary thing. Big fortunes could not arise owing to the much simpler conditions prevailing in the economic life in those days. Very often all the factors of production were controlled by the same person (or persons) and, in such cases, all the shares of the produce practically went to him. Both in the case of peasant-proprietors and the small-scaled handicraftsmen, they supplied the labour as well as the small capital required, and were themselves the organisers. So, on the whole, the question of distribution does not appear to have been so acute or embarrassing as it did become at a later stage of the evolution of society. Still, however, the study of the various questions involved would reveal something which would not be described as harmonious or satisfactory.