________________
SOCIAL LIFE AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS 147
to the Vasettha-gotta', it cannot be maintained that the term gotta stands for ancestral lineage in view of the fact that Kanha, Gotama, Vaseṭṭha and the rest are names of the ancient Rşis who were mostly Brahmins and rarely Khattiyas by their birth. According to the Ambaṭṭha and Tevijja Suttas, the persons, such as Aṭṭhaka, Vamaka, Vamadeva, Vessamitta, Yamataggi, Angirasa, Bharadvaja, Vaseṭṭha, Kassapa and Bhagu, from whom had originated the gottas, were all ancient sages who were composers and promulgators of the mantas or Vedic hymns. As Buddhaghosa suggests, the personal name was meant for recognition, and the gotta or surname for lincage (paññattivasenu nāmam pavenivasena gottam). A history of the gradual division and sub-division of the original ten gotras into many pravaras and śākhās is given in the Divyāvadāna, Ch. xxxiii. Among the Sotthiya-class of Brahmins, many might have been led by sentiment to claim
from those ancient sages. But will always remain open whether l descent implied a line of agnates ken succession of teachers and in the case of gotta, too, there was confusion between the ancestral cultural.
F1 Sumanaalavilāsinī, i, p. 257,
