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which had its orgin, demonstrably in many cases and probably everywhere, in the coating of baskets or wooden vessels with clay in order to render them fire-proof.''27 "The characteristic feature of the period of barbarism is the domestication and breeding of animals and the cultivation of plants.”'88
The middle stage of barbarism begins, in the East, with domestication of animals ; in the West, with cultivation of edible plants by means of irrigation, and with the use of adobes bricks dried in the sun) and stone for buildings."29
The upper stage of barbarism begins with the smelting of iron ore and passes into civilization through the invention of alphabetic writing and its utilization for literary records."30
It is to be noted that Rşabhadeva, the fifteenth Kulakara, according to the Jambūdvipa-prajñapti, was the first tribal leader to make invention of swords1 by smelting iron ore and to introduce alphabetic writing and its utilization for literary records.32 The Age of Nabhi and his son Rşabha was the Age of transition from the upper stage of Kulakarism into the dawn of civilization, which can be compared with the upper stage of barbarism passing into civilization “with the invention of alphabetic writing."38 At this stage...which...was traversed independently only in the eastern hemisphere, more progress was made in production than in all the previous stages put together. To it belong the Greeks of the Heroic Age, the Italian tribes shortly before the foundation of Rome, the Germans of Tacitus and the Normans of the days of the Vikings."34
"Above all, we here encounter for the first time the iron ploughshare drawn by cattle, making possible land cultivation on a wide scale -tillage-and, in the conditions then prevailing, a practically unlimited increase in the means of subsistence; in connection with this
27 28 29
30
Ibid., p. 25. Ibid., p. 25. Ibid., p. 26. Ibid., p. 27. Skt. Mahapurana, Parva 16, II. 179. 362 ; Prakrit Mahapurana, S.V, 19, p. 87. Avasyaka-curni, p. 156, lehattidaram-bambhiya dahinahatthena leho daita. The Origin of the Family, etc., p. 27, Ibid., pp, 27-28.
31
32
34
18/ JANTHOLOGY
