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SOCIAL LIFE AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS 193,
belonging to the four divisions of the people. Though some of the Rgvedic hymns presuppose the prevalence of the custom of the burial, burial was subsequently replaced by cremation, although the cremation was followed by the consecration of the bonos, arranged limb by limb in mounds. The Vedic texts speak of two kinds of citā; agnidagdha, where the corpses were burnt and anagnidagdhā where they were not burnt. This was precisely the custom in some parts of India in Buddha's, time. Accordingly the early Pali texts refer to two different grounds for the disposal of the dead: āļāhana (Ardhamāgadhi, Aņāhaņa), where the dead bodies were cremated and sivathikā or āmakasusāna where the corpses were simply thrown away to undergo the natural process of decomposition or to be devoured by carnivorous beasts, birds, insects, etc. In cases of larger grounds they were placed in charge of susānagopakas 2 who were Candālas. The texts also refer to an aboriginal custom of būrying the dead and washing the bones (aţthidopana) 2 with drunkenness and revelry which was prevalent in southern India.
1 Dhammapada Commentary, 1, p. 68. % Anguttara, v, p. 218; Sumangalavilásini, i, p. 84. Vide B. O. Law, Social, Doonomical and Religious. Conditions of Ancient India gccording to the Buddhist Teata --Pathak Commemoration Volume, pp. 68-79.
