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INTRODUCTION.
dealings points, finally, the whole state of civilisation to which Manu's rules are adapted. The highly developed trade by land and by sea', on which ad valorem duties were imposed, the existence of official lists of prices which were renewed periodically, the complicated system of calculations of interest, among which we find compound interest“, and the occurrence of mortgages", would be impossible without written documents. These facts appear to me so eloquent that even though all the passages adduced above, which explicitly mention written documents, could be proved to be late interpolations, the general aspect of this question would remain unchanged. If, under these circumstances, Manu's rules on evidence contain nothing definite on the admissibility of documents, and if he agrees in this particular with the Dharma-stras and differs strongly from the Dharmasastras of Yågñavalkya and Närada as well as other metrical Smritis, this omission gains a great importance for the historical position of the Samhita. Whether we explain it by an oversight of the editor or by the assumption that he left the determination of the value of written documents to custom or to another Sastra, it shows that he was acquainted with the Dharmasûtras alone or with Dharma-sätras and such metrical Smritis as excluded the section on documents. As he certainly was an adherent of a special law school, and bent on making his work as complete as possible, he would not have omitted so important a point if he had known lawbooks like the Yågnavalkya-smriti.
The omission of the details regarding ordeals is no less significant. Manu VIII, 109–116 describes only the administration of oaths more fully, and mentions the ordeals by fire and water in a cursory manner. Among the Dharma-sätras there is only the Âpastambiya which (II, 29, 6) recommends the employment of divine proof (daiva) or ordeals in a general way without adding any particulars. The secondary law-books of Yågnavalkya and Narada describe five kinds of ordeals, and enter, the second more
I VIII, 156–157. · VIII, 401-401.
' VII, 127-138; VIII, 348. • VIII, 139-142, 151-163.
VIII, 165.
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