History of Technology in India, Vol. I: From Antiquity to c. 1200 A.D. v1.c39.s3.6

v1.c39.s3.6

At a time when the potters had developed beautiful PGW and NBPW potteries, the Maitrāyaṇī Saṃhitā prescribed (Kashikar, 1969) that the ritual milking pot should be prepared by one belonging to any of the first three social orders, but not by a potter of the lowermost caste! The Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa categorised people as well as metals in caste denominations (13.2.2.16-19, 13.3.4.5) : the upper caste gold was meant for kings and brahmins whereas the lower caste iron was meant for ordinary people. This trend of categorising even metals and other materials under the four ‘castes’ persisted for centuries. The Gupta era Amarakośa listed the metallurgical equipments under śūdravarga!, professional guilds, degenerated into sub-castes, the social barriers of which rarely permitted the necessary exchange of technical information amongst themselves or with the brahmin scholars who would keep the Vedas out of bounds from the lower caste artisans. It has been well-said that ‘the evils that caste system engendered cannot be over-estimated’.