History and Doctrines of the Ajivikas: A Vanished Indian Religion c18.s1.81

c18.s1.81

In considering the Ājīvikas in South India we must not disregard the many inscriptions in which no reference to them occurs. It is by no means certain that the examples given above exhaust the inscriptional references to Ājīvikism, for the full text of many inscriptions is not available. But it is certain that there are many inscriptions from the region where Ājīvikas are known to have existed, which make no mention either of the sect or of a tax upon it. One significant inscription of this type is to be found at Kaivāra,¹ where the Ājīvika tax was levied in A.D. 1294.² This inscription, which is dated A.D. 1375, lists a number of village taxes, but not that on the Ājīvikas. We may infer that by this time they had ceased to exist in the village. That the tax was rescinded by the village commune is *a priori* less likely. Similar evidence of the period of the disappearance of the Ājīvikas in other villages is unfortunately lacking.