DDK HistoryF.p65 - CSIR

138 ROTATION OF CROPS [5.8
should be noted that agricultural discoveries of the highest
importance such as.rotation of the crops, and the coarser cereals (e.g.
sorghum), seem to have left no special mark upon ritual. Crop rotation
was, in all probability, incidental to the supply of food proteins. The
ban upon arms, the beef-eating tabu, made it necessary to grow a certain
minimum of the essential proteins on the land, in the form of peas, grams,
pulses, beans. The very same plants, being leguminous, fix nitrogen
in the soil, and can be planted in the rice seed-plots after the rice
seedlings have been transferred (cf. Arth. 2.24). The principal food-grain
crop is produced over the rainy season, the supple-mentaries mostly in
winter ; the wonderful climate permits this (with irrigation, even a third
crop). Rotation was a consequence of the vegetarian diet and economy,
not the result of long observation and forethought; especially where rice,
which gives a balanced meal ONLY with meat, fish or legumes, was first the
staple crop. The rougher food-grains were taken over from the
aborigines, as local products to supplement the main staples.
The incipient society had at its disposal all the Aryan tools and
techniques, plus a few acquired since. AV. 3.12 gives the ritual for leading
river-water into new canals; AV. 6.91.1 speaks of ploughing with
yokes of six and eight oxen. The buffalo had been tamed for
agriculture. Without this useful and characteristically Indian animal,
the swampy tract that most of the Gangetic basin must have been could
not have been brought under cultivation; yet the animal has left no
mark upon our scriptures, except that it was assigned to Yama, the
death-god to ride on, and made into the demon killed by the bloodthirsty
mother-goddess Kali. The horse was ridden for individual transport and
in war, though the traditional chariot remained the more aristocratic
method ; we have noted the importance of the horse-sacrifice. The
elephant had also been tamed for warfare, without imprint upon the
sacred works. Poultry and pigs, of little importance in the economy,
were domesticated. Houses were mostly of wood and thatch so that a
dwelling presented to a brahmin could be dismantled for taking away
(AV. 9.3). Nevertheless, bricks had long been used -for altars and were