Shudras in Ancient India: A Social History of the Lower Order down to circa A.D. 600 c12.269.3

c12.269.3

Manu lays down that, among śūdras, one may eat the food of his sharecropper, a friend of his family, his cow-herd, his slave and his barber.¹ Patañjali informs us that the plates of carpenters, washermen, and blacksmiths could be used after proper cleaning.² This would suggest that in matters of food there were relations of give and take between the members of the higher varṇas and these sections of the śūdra community. To eat the leavings of the śūdras was considered a great sin. It is stated that he who has eaten the leavings of women and śūdras should remove the impurity by drinking barley gruel for seven days and nights.³ Perhaps this rule applies to the brāhmaṇa. Similarly a brāhmaṇa who drinks water left by a śūdra should expiate his sin by drinking water in which kuśa grass has been boiled for three days.⁴ Manu’s provisions throw some light on the dietary habits of the śūdras. The twice-born should perform the cāndrāyaṇa penance if he eats dried meat, mushrooms growing on the earth and meat about the origin of which he has no knowledge, or which had been kept in a slaughter-house.⁵ Similarly if the twice-born takes the meat of carnivorous animals, boars, camels, cocks, crows, human beings and asses, he should perform a very difficult penance known as the taptakṛcchra.⁶ If in these references the dvija is taken as a member of the first three varṇas, it would imply that śūdras were free to take all varieties of meat.