Republics in Ancient India, c. 1500 B.C.–500 B.C. c15.s1.11

c15.s1.11

A close examination of both stories points to the Buddhist writers' arduous attempts to establish a relationship between their Master's clan and that of the Moriyas, probably in order to connect the Mauryan emperor Aśoka with the line of the Śākyamuni. No reference to such a relationship occurs in the Pāli Canon itself and there is no other source to confirm such a blood-bond. If the tradition of the *Parinirvāṇa* is correct, the Moriyas were certainly not the later descendants of the Sakyas as we find both the Sakyas and the Moriyas claiming their share in the relics of the Buddha at his death.¹ The Moriyas were contemporary with the Sakyas and were probably of an old Aryan stock like the other republican peoples of the Buddhist and the Jaina texts. The only known early Buddhist source which mentions the Moriyas is the *Dīgha Nikāya*. Raychaudhuri and Law have both accepted the connection of the Moriyas and the Sakyas without any solid evidence.²