the Sudras. Women were also denied upanayana and Gayatri mantra. The king asserted his authority over the three varnas. The Aitreya Brahmana refers to the Brahmana as the seeker of support and he could be removed by king from his position.
Certain craft groups managed to attain higher status. For example, the Rathakaras, the chariot makers, had the right to wear the sacred thread. Vaisya referred to the common people. They were involved in agriculture, cattle breeding and artisans.
Later they became traders. Vaisyas paid tax to the kings. Some social groups were placed in ranking even below the Sudras. The idea of gotra emerged in the later Vedic period.
Gotra literally meant ‘cowpen’ and it referred to a group of people from a common in transition. Several lineages became more territorial and settled in the Later Vedic Age. This is evidenced by the term janapada, as we saw earlier. The mid-first millennium BCE had political organisations such as rajya and ganasanghas (oligarchies) and these institutions developed in the later Vedic period.
Lineage is a group of people descended from a common ancestor. As we saw earlier, the clans of Bharatas and Purus combined to form the Kurus, and along with the Panchalas they occupied the central part of the Ganga-Yamuna doab. Panchala territory was in north-western Uttar Pradesh. The Kuru-Panchalas became one major ethnic group and Hastinapur became their capital.
The war between the Kauravas and Pandavas was the theme of the Mahabharata and both of them belonged to the clan of Kurus. Traditions say that Hastinapur was flooded and the Kuru clan moved to Kausambi near Allahabad. Sacrifices and rituals gained importance in the Later Vedic society. The king became more independent.
Rituals dominated kingship, and this increased the power and influence of the Rajanyas and the Brahmanas , while distancing the king from the vis . The Asvamedha-yaga involved letting a horse loose into areas where it moved freely; this was an assertion that the authority of the king was recognized, and a battle ensued when the horse was challenged. The vajapeya ritual involved a chariot race.