The State in Ancient India: A Study in the Structure and Practical Working of Political Institutions in North India in Ancient Times c10.24

c10.24

allusion is to those who claimed Brahmanic privileges on the score of caste though they had renounced scholastic or priestly callings. In many stories, for instance, in the Sambhava Jātaka, V, 27, Juṇha Jātaka, IV, 96, Brāhmaṇas play a rather ignominious role. (Also in I, 425, IV, 484.) On the other hand, the Buddhists themselves occasionally laid emphasis on birth. In the Nidānakathā (I, 2) the first Bodhisatta is Brāhmaṇa of good family, on both sides, up to the seventh generation. The Jambukhādaka Jātaka (II, 438) speaks of descent as implying nobility.