Republics in Ancient India, c. 1500 B.C.–500 B.C. c10.s1: Not the Qualified Champions of Aryan Culture
Republics in Ancient India, c. 1500 B.C.–500 B.C. c10.s1
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Not the Qualified Champions of Aryan Culture
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The study of the Videhas presents peculiar problems that do not appear among others republics of the Buddhist period. They are included if not directly mentioned, among the *Prācyas* in the ethnological table of the *Aitareya Brāhmaṇa*.¹ Unlike the Licchavis who are conspicuously absent in the *Brāhmaṇa* literature, the Videhas are mentioned in these sources but do not enjoy the prestige of the Kuru-Pāñcālas. In the *Brāhmaṇas* they are closely associated with the Kāśīs, Kośalas, Magadhans and Aṅgas.² All these peoples inhabited the land east of the Ganges-Yamunā confluence to the north and south of the river. This was the home of the oldest Jaina and Buddhist communities lying in or near the tracts into which Agni Vaiśvānara did not cross in the flaming course of his travel over the east.³
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¹ *Ait. Br.*, 8, 14.
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² *Loc. cit.*; *Gopatha Br.*, 2, 9; *Kauś. Up.*, 4, 1, etc.
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³ *Śat. Br.*, 1, 4, 10ff; Eggeling, *SBE*, xii, p. xli, fn. 4; 104 fn.; cf. *Vedic Index*, ii, p. 298; Oldenberg, *Buddha*, pp. 10-11.
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Manu, probably following the older *Sūtra* texts, defines the land of the *Brahmarṣis*, whose customs and rites are taken as a model and whose warriors are the bravest, as Kurukṣetra and the territory of the Matsyas, the Pāñcālas and the Śūrasenas.⁴ Thus, the land of the *Brahmarṣis* embraces what was set down in the *Aitareya Brāhmaṇa* as *Madhyamadiś* and the region south of it. But what was regarded in the *Aitareya* as west and east, above all the eastern peoples of Kāśī, Kośala, Videha and Magadha, is in Manu also excluded from the land of the *Brahmarṣis*.⁵
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⁴ *Manu*, ii, 19; vii, 193.
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⁵ Cf. Oldenberg, *Buddha*, pp. 393-4.
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Thus we have here a distinction between those stocks who felt themselves to be the "qualified champions of Aryan Culture, and those who were Aryans, it is true, but were not regarded as equally accredited partakers in this culture".⁶
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⁶ *Ibid.*, p. 394.
Linked texts (5)
- Mānava Dharmaśāstra — Manu & Bhṛgu, Sanskrit
- Kauṣītakibrāhmaṇopaniṣad — Sanskrit
- Aitareyabrāhmaṇa — Mahidāsa Aitareya, Sanskrit
- Śatapathabrāhmaṇa — Yājñavalkya & Śāṇḍilya (Vedic teacher), Sanskrit
- Gopathabrāhmaṇa — Sanskrit