Shudras in Ancient India: A Social History of the Lower Order down to circa A.D. 600 c10.364

c10.364

Āpastamba provides that women and śūdras may learn a supplement to the *Atharva Veda*.¹ It is suggested that this comprises dancing, music, and other branches of everyday art and learning.² In commenting on a passage of Gautama Maskarin refers to a similar type of education. He quotes the Smṛtis as stating that a niṣāda should be initiated and educated in the art of elephant training.³ All this may imply that the śūdras could receive training in arts and crafts but were debarred from receiving Vedic education, which was more or less identical with literate learning. Thus the Dharmasūtras sought to establish a divorce between literate education, which was confined to the members of the twice-born varṇas, and technical training, which lay in the sphere of the śūdras. It was also stated that Vedic study impedes pursuit of agriculture and *vice versa*.⁴ Such a rule would naturally affect not only the śūdras but also those vaiśyas who carried on agriculture themselves. We do not know how far this policy worked in practice. A later Jātaka informs us that two caṇḍāla boys went in disguise to receive education at Taxila, but, when they were detected through the inadvertant use of their own dialect, they were expelled from the institution.⁵ Nevertheless, other Jātaka stories show that the schools had on their rolls sons of merchants and tailors,⁶ and even fishermen.⁷ Thus in practice even during this period the śūdras were not completely excluded from receiving education.