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150
STUDIES IN THE BHAGAWATI SUTRA
Ch. IV
Moreover, the word "caste” is derived from Latin "Castus' meaning purity of blood which was transformed into the Portuguese word 'casta'.
It is the Portuguese who first used this word "caste" as understood now to denote the institution of the social system of the Hindus based on distinction of races or castes (Castas).
The earliest reference to it is found in a Decree of the sacred council of Goa of A.D. 1567, published in the Portuguese Chronicles in which it is said, “The Gentoos divide themselves into distinct races or castes (Castas) of greater or less dignity, holding the Christians as of lower degree and keep these so superistitiously that no one of higher-caste can eat or drink with those of a lower."
This term Caste' was thus subsequently used by all the Europeans to denote tho social distinctions of the Hindus. : Restrictions as to connubium and commensality and the pride of purity of birth are the most important criteria of the origin of Indian caste-system which did not exist as an established institution in a rigid form before the age of the latter Samhitās.
The Manu-Smrti attributes the origin of caste in a strict sense to the mixed marriages.
"Strīşu anantara jātāsu dvijairutpāditānsutan
Sadrśāneva tānāburmātsdoşa-vigarbitān" (6).
Because the birth, the main element, combined with other factors, such as, tribal connexion, religion, occupation, political, economic, and geographical circumstances, etc., consolidated different social groups and simultaneously isolated them, contributing to the rise of the caste system.
The BhS reveals that the society was based on the tradi. tional caste system of India which consisted of the Brāhmana:
1 Imperial Gazetteer of India, I, 311 f., Vide Racial Synthesis
by Visvanāthan. : Cambridge History of India, Vol. I p. 112; Vedic Age, p. 449 f,
p. 450. : Manu-Smrti 10, 6.
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