The State in Ancient India: A Study in the Structure and Practical Working of Political Institutions in North India in Ancient Times c10.2.1

c10.2.1

The literary productions of the Brâhmaṇas—the Dharma Sûtras, the Epics and later, the Dharma Śâstras—studiously ignore the heretical movements which had arisen or were flourishing contemporaneously. Each school follows its own tradition in a cloister or grove. None can be taken as an exact reflection of the totality of political circumstances in any given epoch. The Brahmanic data are usefully supplemented by Buddhist tradition. The faith of Gautama Buddha whose career lay between the sixth and fifth centuries before Christ first took root in Magadha. There as in some neighbouring districts Brahmanic influence was less strong than anywhere else in North India. In the orthodox computation, Kâśi and Magadha are excluded from Brahmarṣideśa. Manu includes Magadhas and Videhas in his list of mixed castes.¹ In the course of a few centuries the Buddhists had produced a literature which challenges comparison with that of the Brâhmaṇas. The word of the Buddha, according to the orthodox tradition, is contained in the Tripiṭaka or the Three Baskets: (1) Sutta, comprising the five Nikâyas or collections, (2) Vinaya, giving rules of monastic life for monks and nuns in five works, the Pâtimokkha, Mahâvagga, Cullavagga, Suttavibhaṅga and Parivara and (3) Abhidhamma, comparatively inferior, which discusses metaphysics in seven compendiums.