Shudras in Ancient India: A Social History of the Lower Order down to circa A.D. 600 c10.542

c10.542

It would be superficial to suggest that mere ideas of ceremonial purity and cleanliness led to the exclusion of the śūdras from the sacrificial rites and table of the people of the higher varṇas.³ The fact has to be stressed that such ideas could develop only after a considerable section of society had been condemned to the position of a hereditary working class and consequently had come to be regarded as impure because of their manual work. This spirit of contempt for the physical labour of the lower orders ultimately degenerated into the practice of untouchability.