Grihya Sutras

SR No.: 007685
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Hermann Oldenberg
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1886
Total Pages: 2642
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 49 MB

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that the Brahmanas preferred skins, and the Kshatriyas clothes, for he says that those who wish well to the Bråhmanas should wear agina, skins, and those who wish well to the Kshatriyas should wear vastra, clothes, and those who wish well to both should wear both, but, in that case, the skin should always form the outer garment. The Dharma-sutras of the Gautamas, which were published in India, prescribe likewise for the Brahmana the black antelope skin, and allow clothes of hemp or linen (sânakshaumakîra) as well as kutapas (woollen cloth) for all. What is new among the Gautamas is, that they add the kârpåsa, the cotton dress, which is important as showing an early knowledge of this manufacture. The kârpâsa dress occurs once more as a present to be given to the Potar priest (Âsv. Srauta-sûtras IX, 4), and was evidently considered as a valuable present, taking precedence of the kshaumî or linen dress. It is provided that the cotton dress should not be dyed, for this, I suppose, is the meaning of avikrita. Immediately after, however, it is said, that some authorities say the dress should be dyed red (kâshâyam apy eke), the very expression which occurred in Apastamba, and that, in that case, the red for
the Brahmana's dress should be taken from the bark of trees (vârksha). Manu, who here, as elsewhere, simply paraphrases the ancient Sûtras, says, II, 41:
kârshnarauravabâstâni karmâni brahmakârinal vasîrann ânupûrvyena sânakshaumâvikâni ka. 'Let Brahmakârins wear (as outer garments) the skins of the black antelope, the deer, the goat, (as under garments) dresses of hemp, flax, and sheep's wool, in the order of the three castes.'
VEDIC HYMNS.
The Sanskrit name for a dressed skin is agina, a word which does not occur in the Rig-veda, but which, if Bopp is right in deriving it from agá, goat, as alyis from aïs, would have meant originally, not skin in general, but a goat-skin. The skins of the éta, here ascribed to the Maruts, would be identical with the aineya, which Asvalâyana ascribes to the Brahmana, not, as we should expect, to the Kshatriya, if, as has been supposed, aineya is derived from ena, which is a secondary form, particularly in the
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