Life in Ancient India as Depicted in Jain Canons

Author(s): Jagdishchandra Jain
Publisher: New Book Company

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LIFE IN ANCIENT INDIA
False testimony (kūḍasakkha) and falsification of documents (kūḍalehakarana) were common.18
II
CRIME AND PUNISHMENT
ROBBERY
Various kinds of offences are mentioned in the Jain texts, amongst which robbery, adultery murder and non-execution of the king's order are the chief. Robbery was considered a regular art (vyja) in ancient India,14 Various types of thieves are mentioned thieves (amosa), robbers (lomahara), cut-purses (ganthibheya) and burglars (takkara) The Jain canons describe a number of robbers of fame, who resided well-guarded in the robber-settlements known as corapalli. The Vivagasuya gives a graphic description of a corapalle known as Sālādavi situated in the north of Purimatala in a forest. The corapalli was located in an unapproachable mountain-ravine; it was further guarded by a wall and bamboo-hedges (vamsijali) and surrounded by a trench (phariha) formed by inaccessible water-falls (pavara) of the mountain It had one gate but there were many secret passages and it had its own water supply.10 Sihaguha is mentioned as another corapalli in Rayagiha.17
The claborate description of the robbers given in Jain canons1s shows that they were very powerful and it was difficult even for the king to suppress them There were regular fights between the king's army and the robbers which sometimes resulted in the defeat of the former The robbers carried off the cows, horses, maid-servants, children,20 even nuns,21 and set fire to the villages, towns, houses and forests They destroyed the ships, extracted money at the point of the sword, made
19
18 Uru, p 10, also nots, p 215, A.a Si, (Harı ), p 820
14 Science of larceny is ascribed to various authors headed by Skanda, Kanakasaktı, Bhaskaranandi and Yogacaya Ilucves were also called Skandaputra Compaic Gicuian Mercury and St Nicholas of England 1 his God was the patron deity of thieves. Radhi Govind Basaka, IHQ, V, 1929 pp 312 ff, also see Kathasaritsigara (Vol II, pp 183 41, note on 'Stealing Müladeva is considered as the arch-thief of Hindu fiction, whom Bloomfield identifies with Karnisuta, Goniputraka, Gonikaputra or Gonikasuta He is supposed to have written a famous manual of thieving entitled Steyashstrap avartaka' or Steyavitraprava taka Müladeva is also mentioned in the com on the Digha (I, 89), also see Dr A N Upadhye's Dhürlükhyuna, A critical Study, p 23 and note.
15 Uttara Sū, 9 28 foi seven types of robbers and eighteen ways of encouraging robbery, see Panha Ti 3, p 58, cf the types of coras in the Buddhist literature, Law, India Described, pp 172 f
16 3, p 20
17 Naya, 18, p 200
18 Panha, 3, pp 43a ff
18 Cf also Mahabhi, I, 233, 5 T
30 See Uttaru cu, p 174, cf also Mrcchakatika (IV, 6) which refers to children being robbel a vay from the lap of the nurses
1 Cf Vya. Blu., 7, p 71a, Brh Bha., 6 6275,