A History of Sanskrit Literature

Horses came next in value to cattle, for wealth in steeds is constantly prayed for along with abundance of cows. To a people so frequently engaged in battle, the horse was of essential value in drawing the war-car; he was also indispensable in the chariot-race, to which the Vedic Indian was devoted. He was, however, not yet used for riding. The horse-sacrifice, moreover, was regarded as the most important and efficacious of animal sacrifices.

Of the birds of the Rigveda I need only mention those which have some historical or literary interest. The wild goose or swan (haṃsa), so familiar to the classical poets, is frequently referred to, being said to swim in the water and to fly in a line. The curious power of separating soma from water is attributed to it in the White Yajurveda, as that of extracting milk from water is in the later poetry. The latter faculty belongs to the curlew (krunch), according to the same Veda.

The chakravāka or ruddy goose, on the fidelity of which the post-Vedic poets so often dwell, is mentioned once in the Rigveda, the Açvins being said to come in the morning like a couple of these birds, while the Atharva-veda already refers to them as models of conjugal love. Peahens (mayūrī) are spoken of in the Rigveda as removing poison, and parrots (çuka) are alluded to as yellow. By the time of the Yajurveda the latter bird had been tamed, for it is there described as “uttering human speech.”

A good illustration of the dangers of the argumentum ex silentio is furnished by the fact that salt, the most necessary of minerals, is never once mentioned in the Rigveda. And yet the Northern Panjāb is the very part of India where it most abounds. It occurs in the salt range between the Indus and the Jhelum in such quantities that the Greek companions of Alexander, according to Strabo, asserted the supply to be sufficient for the wants of the whole of India.

Among the metals, gold is the one most frequently mentioned in the Rigveda. It was probably for the most part obtained from the rivers of the north-west, which even at the present day are said to yield considerable quantities of the precious metal. Thus the Indus is spoken of by the poets as “golden” or “having a golden bed.” There are indications that kings possessed gold in abundance. Thus one poet praises his royal benefactor for bestowing ten nuggets of gold upon him besides other bountiful gifts. Gold ornaments of various kinds, such as ear-rings and armlets, are often mentioned.

The metal which is most often referred to in the Rigveda next to gold is called ayas (Latin, aes). It is a matter of no slight historical interest to decide whether this signifies “iron” or not. In most passages where it occurs the word appears to mean simply “metal.” In the few cases where it designates a particular metal, the evidence is not very conclusive; but the inference which may be drawn as to its colour is decidedly in favour of its having been reddish, which points to bronze and not iron. The fact that the Atharva-veda distinguishes between “dark” ayas and “red,” seems to indicate that the distinction between iron and copper or bronze had only recently been drawn. It is, moreover, well known that in the progress of civilisation the use of bronze always precedes that of iron. Yet it would be rash to assert that iron was altogether unknown even to the earlier Vedic age. It seems quite likely that the Aryans of that period were unacquainted with silver, for its name is not mentioned in the Rigveda, and the knowledge of silver goes hand in hand with that of iron, owing to the manner in which these metals are intermingled in the ore which produces them. These two metals, moreover, are not found in any quantity in the north-west of India.

The evidence of the topography, the climate, and the products of the country thus shows that the people by whose poets the Rigveda was composed were settled in the north-west of India, from the Kabul to the Jumna. But they were still engaged in conflict with the aborigines, for many victories over them are referred to. Thus Indra is said to have bound 1000 or slain 30,000 of them for his allies. That the conquerors were bent on acquiring new territory appears from the rivers being frequently mentioned as obstacles to farther advance. The invaders, though split up into many tribes, were conscious of a unity of race and religion. They styled themselves Āryas or “kinsmen,” as opposed to the aborigines, to whom they gave the name of Dasyu or Dāsa, “fiends,” in later times also called anārya, or non-Aryans. The characteristic physical difference between the two races was that of colour (varṇa), the aborigines being described as “black” (kṛishṇa) or “black-skins,” and as the “Dāsa colour,” in contrast with the “Aryan colour” or “our colour.” This contrast undoubtedly formed the original basis of caste, the regular name for which in Sanskrit is “colour.”

Those of the conquered race who did not escape to the hills and were captured became slaves. Thus one singer receives from his royal patron a hundred asses, a hundred sheep, and a hundred Dāsas. The latter word in later Sanskrit regularly means servant or slave, much in the same way as “captive Slav” to the German came to mean “slave.” When thoroughly subjected, the original inhabitants, ceasing to be called Dasyus, became the fourth caste under the later name of Çūdras. The Dasyus are described in the Rigveda as non-sacrificing, unbelieving, and impious. They are also doubtless meant by the phallus-worshippers mentioned in two passages. The Aryans in course of time came to adopt this form of cult. There are several passages in the Mahābhārata showing that Çiva was already venerated under the emblem of the phallus when that epic was composed. Phallus-worship is widely diffused in India at the present day, but is most prevalent in the south. The Dasyus appear to have been a pastoral race, for they possessed large herds, which were captured by the victorious Aryans. They fortified themselves in strongholds (called pur), which must have been numerous, as Indra is sometimes said to have destroyed as many as a hundred of them for his allies.

The Rigveda mentions many tribes among the Aryans. The most north-westerly of these are the Gandhāris, who, judged by the way they are referred to, must have been breeders of sheep. They were later well known as Gandhāras or Gāndhāras. The Atharva-veda mentions as contiguous to the Gandhāris the Mūjavats, a tribe doubtless settled close to Mount Mūjavat; evidently regarding these two as the extreme limit of the Aryan settlements to the north-west.

The most important part, if not the whole, of the Indian Aryans is meant by the “five tribes,” an expression of frequent occurrence in the Rigveda. It is not improbable that by this term were meant five tribes which are enumerated together in two passages, the Pūrus, Turvaças, Yadus, Anus, and Druhyus. These are often mentioned as engaged in intertribal conflicts. Four of them, along with some other clans, are named as having formed a coalition under ten kings against Sudās, chief of the Tṛitsus. The opposing forces met on the banks of the Parushṇī, where the great “battle of the ten kings” was fought. The coalition, in their endeavours to cross the stream and to deflect its course, were repulsed with heavy loss by the Tṛitsus.

The Pūrus are described as living on both banks of the Sarasvatī. A part of them must, however, have remained behind farther west, as they were found on the Parushṇī in Alexander’s time. The Rigveda often mentions their king, Trasadasyu, son of Purukutsa, and speaks of his descendant Tṛikshi as a powerful prince. The Turvaças are one of the most frequently named of the tribes. With them are generally associated the Yadus, among whom the priestly family of the Kaṇvas seems to have lived. It is to be inferred from one passage of the Rigveda that the Anus were settled on the Parushṇī, and the priestly family of the Bhṛigus, it would appear, belonged to them. Their relations to the Druhyus seem to have been particularly close. The Matsyas, mentioned only in one passage of the Rigveda, were also foes of the Tṛitsus. In the Mahābhārata we find them located on the western bank of the Yamunā.

A more important name among the enemies of Sudās is that of the Bharatas. One hymn (iii. 33) describes them as coming to the rivers Vipāç and Çutudrī accompanied by Viçvāmitra, who, as we learn from another hymn (iii. 53), had formerly been the chief priest of Sudās, and who now made the waters fordable for the Bharatas by his prayers. This is probably the occasion on which, according to another hymn (vii. 33), the Bharatas were defeated by Sudās and his Tṛitsus, who were aided by the invocations of Vasishṭha, the successor and rival of Viçvāmitra. The Bharatas appear to be specially connected with sacrificial rites in the Rigveda; for Agni receives the epithet Bhārata, “belonging to the Bharatas,” and the ritual goddess Bhāratī, frequently associated with Sarasvatī, derives her name from them. In a hymn to Agni (iii. 23), mention is made of two Bharatas named Devaçravas and Devavāta who kindled the sacred fire on the Dṛishadvatī, the Āpayā, and the Sarasvatī, the very region which is later celebrated as the holy land of Brahmanism under the names of Brahmāvarta and Kurukshetra. The family of the Kuçikas, to whom Viçvāmitra belonged, was closely connected with the Bharatas.

The Tṛitsus appear to have been settled somewhere to the east of the Parushṇī, on the left bank of which Sudās may be supposed to have drawn up his forces to resist the coalition of the ten kings attempting to cross the stream from the west. Five tribes, whose names do not occur later, are mentioned as allied with Sudās in the great battle. The Sṛinjayas were probably also confederates of the Tṛitsus, being, like the latter, described as enemies of the Turvaças.

Of some tribes we learn nothing from the Rigveda but the name, which, however, survives till later times. Thus the Uçīnaras, mentioned only once, were, at the period when the Aitareya Brāhmaṇa was composed, located in the middle of Northern India; and the Chedis, also referred to only once, are found in the epic age settled in Magadha (Southern Behar). Krivi, as a tribal name connected with the Indus and Asiknī, points to the north-west. In the Çatapatha Brāhmaṇa it is stated to be the old name of the Panchālas, who inhabited the country to the north of the modern Delhi.

The Atharva-veda mentions as remote tribes not only the Gandhāris and Mūjavats, but also the Magadhas (Behar) and the Angas (Bengal). We may therefore conclude that by the time that Veda was completed the Aryans had already spread to the Delta of the Ganges.

The Panchālas are not mentioned in either Veda, and the name of the Kurus is only found there indirectly in two or three compounds or derivatives. They are first referred to in the White Yajurveda; yet they are the two most prominent peoples of the Brāhmaṇa period. On the other hand, the names of a number of the most important of the Rigvedic tribes, such as the Pūrus, Turvaças, Yadus, Tṛitsus, and others, have entirely or practically disappeared from the Brāhmaṇas. Even the Bharatas, though held in high regard by the composers of the Brāhmaṇas, and set up by them as models of correct conduct, appear to have ceased to represent a political entity, for there are no longer any references to them in that sense, as to other peoples of the day. Their name, moreover, does not occur in the tribal enumerations of the Aitareya Brāhmaṇa and of Manu, while it is practically altogether ignored in the Buddhistic literature.

Such being the case, it is natural to suppose that the numerous Vedic tribes, under the altered conditions of life in vast plains, coalesced into nations with new names. Thus the Bharatas, to whom belonged the royal race of the Kurus in the epic, and from whom the very name of the Mahābhārata, which describes the great war of the Kurus, is derived, were doubtless absorbed in what came to be called the Kuru nation. In the genealogical system of the Mahābhārata the Pūrus are brought into close connection with the Kurus. This is probably an indication that they too had amalgamated with the latter people. It is not unlikely that the Tṛitsus, whose name disappears after the Rigveda, also furnished one of the elements of the Kuru nation.

As to the Panchālas, we have seen that they represent the old Krivis. It is, however, likely that the latter combined with several small tribes to make up the later nation. A Brāhmaṇa passage contains an indication that the Turvaças may have been one of these. Perhaps the Yadus, generally associated with the Turvaças in the Rigveda, were also one of them. The epic still preserves the name, in the patronymic form of Yādava, as that of the race in which Kṛishṇa was born. The name of the Panchālas itself (derived from pancha, five) seems to indicate that this people consisted of an aggregate of five elements.

Some of the tribes mentioned in the Rigveda, however, maintained their individual identity under their old names down to the epic period. These were the Uçīnaras, Sṛinjayas, Matsyas, and Chedis.

It is interesting to note that the Rigveda refers to a rich and powerful prince called Ikshvāku. In the epic this name recurs as that of a mighty king who ruled to the east of the Ganges in the city of Ayodhyā (Oudh) and was the founder of the Solar race.

It is clear from what has been said that the Vedic Aryans were split up into numerous tribes, which, though conscious of their unity in race, language, and religion, had no political cohesion. They occasionally formed coalitions, it is true, but were just as often at war with one another. The tribe, in fact, was the political unit, organised much in the same way as the Afghans are at the present day, or the Germans were in the time of Tacitus. The tribe (jana) consisted of a number of settlements (viç), which again were formed of an aggregate of villages (grāma). The fighting organisation of the tribe appears to have been based on these divisions. The houses forming the village seem to have been built entirely of wood, as they still were in the time of Megasthenes. In the midst of each house the domestic fire burnt. For protection against foes or inundations, fortified enclosures (called pur) were made on eminences. They consisted of earthworks strengthened with a stockade, or occasionally with stone. There is nothing to show that they were inhabited, much less that pur ever meant a town or city, as it did in later times.

The basis of Vedic society being the patriarchal family, the government of the tribe was naturally monarchical. The king (rāja) was often hereditary. Thus several successive members of the same family are mentioned as rulers of the Tṛitsus and of the Pūrus. Occasionally, however, the king was elected by the districts (viç) of the tribe; but whether the choice was then limited to members of the royal race, or was extended to certain noble families, does not appear. In times of peace the main duty of the king was to ensure the protection of his people. In return they rendered him obedience, and supplied him with voluntary gifts—not fixed taxes—for his maintenance. His power was by no means absolute, being limited by the will of the people expressed in the tribal assembly (samiti). As to the constitution and functions of the latter, we have unfortunately little or no information. In war, the king of course held the chief command. On important occasions, such as the eve of a battle, it was also his duty to offer sacrifice on behalf of his tribe, either performing the rites himself, or employing a priest to do so.

Every tribe doubtless possessed a family of singers who attended the king, praising his deeds as well as composing hymns to accompany the sacrifice in honour of the gods. Depending on the liberality of their patrons, these poets naturally did not neglect to lay stress on the efficacy of their invocations, and on the importance of rewarding them well for their services. The priest whom a king appointed to officiate for him was called a purohita or domestic chaplain. Vasishṭha occupied that position in the employ of King Sudās; and in one of his hymns (vii. 33) he does not fail to point out that the victory of the Tṛitsus was due to his prayers. The panegyrics on liberal patrons contain manifest exaggerations, partly, no doubt, intended to act as an incentive to other princes. Nevertheless, the gifts in gold, cows, horses, chariots, and garments bestowed by kings on their chief priests must often have been considerable, especially after important victories. Under the later Brahmanic hierarchy liberality to the priestly caste became a duty, while the amount of the sacrificial fee was fixed for each particular rite.

The employment of Purohitas by kings as their substitutes in the performance of sacrificial functions is to be regarded as the beginning and the oldest form of the priesthood in India. It became the starting-point of the historically unique hierarchical order in which the sacerdotal caste occupied the supreme position in society, and the State was completely merged in the Church. Such, indeed, was the ideal of the Catholic Church in the West during the Middle Ages, but it never became an accomplished fact in Europe, as it did in India. No sooner had the priesthood become hereditary than the development of a caste system began, which has had no parallel in any other country. But during the period represented by Sudās and Vasishṭha, in which the older portion of the Rigveda was composed, the priesthood was not yet hereditary, still less had the warrior and sacerdotal classes became transformed into castes among the Aryan tribes settled in the Panjāb. This is confirmed by the fact that in the epic age the inhabitants of Madhyadeça or Mid-land, where the Brahmanic caste system grew up, regarded the people of the north-west as semi-barbarians.

In the simple social organisation of the Vedic tribes of this region, where occupations were but little differentiated, every man was a soldier as well a civilian, much as among the Afghans of to-day. As they moved farther to the east, society became more complex, and vocations tended to become hereditary. The population being now spread over wider tracts of territory, the necessity arose for something in the nature of a standing army to repel sudden attacks or quell risings of the subject aborigines. The nucleus would have been supplied by the families of the chiefs of lesser tribes which had amalgamated under some military leader. The agricultural and industrial part of the population were thus left to follow their pursuits without interruption. Meanwhile the religious ceremonial was increasing in complexity; its success was growing more dependent on correct performance, while the preservation of the ancient hymns was becoming more urgent. The priests had, therefore, to devote all their time and energies to the carrying out of their religious duties and the handing down of the sacred tradition in their families.

Owing to these causes, the three main classes of Aryan society became more and more separated. But how were they transformed into castes or social strata divided from one another by the impassable barriers of heredity and the prohibition of intermarrying or eating together? This rigid mutual exclusiveness must have started, in the first instance, from the treatment of the conquered aborigines, who, on accepting the Aryan belief, were suffered to form a part of the Aryan polity in the capacity of a servile class. The gulf between the two races need not have been wider than that which at the present day, in the United States, divides the whites from the negroes. When the latter are described as men of “colour,” the identical term is used which, in India, came to mean “caste.” Having become hereditary, the sacerdotal class succeeded in securing a position of sanctity and inviolability which raised them above the rest of the Aryans as the latter were raised above the Dāsas. When their supremacy was established, they proceeded to organise the remaining classes in the state on similar lines of exclusiveness. To the time when the system of the three Aryan castes, with the Çūdras added as a fourth, already existed in its fundamental principles, belong the greater part of the independent portions of the Yajurveda, a considerable part of the Atharva-veda (most of books viii. to xiii.), but of the Rigveda, besides the one (x. 90) which distinctly refers to the four castes by name, only a few of the latest hymns of the first, eighth, and tenth books. The word brāhmaṇa, the regular name for “man of the first caste,” is still rare in the Rigveda, occurring only eight times, while brahman, which simply means sage or officiating priest, is found forty-six times.

We may now pass on to sketch rapidly the social conditions which prevailed in the period of the Rigveda. The family, in which such relationships as a wife’s brother and a husband’s brother or sister had special names, was clearly the foundation of society. The father was at its head as “lord of the house” (gṛihapati). Permission to marry a daughter was asked from him by the suitor through the mediation of an intimate friend. The wedding was celebrated in the house of the bride’s parents, whither the bridegroom, his relatives, and friends came in procession. Here they were entertained with the flesh of cows slain in honour of the occasion. Here, too, the bridegroom took the bride’s hand and led her round the nuptial fire. The Atharva-veda adds that he set down a stone on the ground, asking the bride to step upon it for the obtainment of offspring. On the conclusion of the wedding festivities, the bride, anointed and in festal array, mounted with her husband a car adorned with red flowers and drawn by two white bulls. On this she was conducted in procession to her new home. The main features of this nuptial ceremony of 3000 years ago still survive in India.

Though the wife, like the children, was subject to the will of her husband, she occupied a position of greater honour in the age of the Rigveda than in that of the Brāhmaṇas, for she participated with her husband in the offering of sacrifice. She was mistress of the house (gṛihapatnī), sharing the control not only of servants and slaves, but also of the unmarried brothers and sisters of her husband. From the Yajurveda we learn that it was customary for sons and daughters to marry in the order of their age, but the Rigveda more than once speaks of girls who remained unmarried and grew old in their father’s house. As the family could only be continued in the male line, abundance of sons is constantly prayed for, along with wealth in cattle and land, and the newly wedded husband hopes that his bride may become a mother of heroes. Lack of sons was placed on the same level as poverty, and adoption was regarded as a mere makeshift. No desire for the birth of daughters is ever expressed in the Rigveda; their birth is deprecated in the Atharva-veda, and the Yajurveda speaks of girls being exposed when born. Fathers, even in the earliest Vedic times, would doubtless have sympathised with the sentiment of the Aitareya Brāhmaṇa, that “to have a daughter is a misery.” This prejudice survives in India to the present day with unabated force.

That the standard of morality was comparatively high may be inferred from the fact that adultery and rape were counted among the most serious offences, and illegitimate births were concealed.

One or two passages indicate that the practice of exposing old men, found among many primitive peoples, was not unknown to the Rigveda.

Among crimes, the commonest appears to have been robbery, which generally took the form of cattle-lifting, mostly practised at night. Thieves and robbers are often mentioned, and the Rigveda contains many prayers for protection at home, abroad, and on journeys. Such criminals, when caught, were punished by being tied to stakes with cords. Debts (ṛiṇa) were often incurred, chiefly, it would seem, at play, and the Rigveda even speaks of paying them off by instalments.