India: A History

by John Keay

Basically the Vedas and the epics portray the concerns, and celebrate the exploits, of a society consisting almost entirely of well-born clansmen. Known as ksatriya and rajanya, these warrior families acknowledged a chief with whom they shared a common ancestor. The chief was their raja, a term rich in potential for misunderstanding in that it later came to mean a king in the monarchical states and an elector, or a participant in government, in the republics. Thus Vaisali, the capital of the Licchavi gana-sangha in northern Bihar,is said to have housed 7707 rajas, or in another account ‘twice 84,000 rajas’. As well as the leadership of their rajas, the ksatriya also acknowledged the ritual insights and sacerdotal authority of a non-ksatriya priesthood, the brahmans. The latter, their profession becoming hereditary and exclusive through emphasis on their descent from certain ancient risis or seers, assumed the status of a parallel caste with well advertised rights and taboos derived from their monopoly of sacrificial lore, of religious orthodoxy and of academic jargon. To these two castes was appended a third, possibly to differentiate clansmen of less