Education in Ancient India c14.s4.3

c14.s4.3

Who were eligible? Samāvartana or Snāna² ceremony was performed at the end of the Brahmacarya period to mark the termination of the education course³. When however in the course of time, the original nature and purport of the ritual were forgotten and the Upanayana began to be regarded as an obligatory and bodily Saṃskāra, this ritual also came to be performed in all cases, irrespective of the consideration as to whether any educational course was followed by the youth or not. In early times it was performed when the education of the youth was over; marriage usually followed, but by no means immediately. In later times the ritual came to be performed as a kind of necessary formality just before the marriage, when it was settled.⁴ (VMS. p. 575)