प्राचीन भारत में शिक्षा (डॉ. ए.एस. अल्तेकर - गुरुकुल एवं बौद्ध विहार शिक्षण इतिहास)

178 EDUCATION IN ANCIENT INDIA [Ch. dārakāchāryas (teachers of little children) respectively.¹ Public schools even for higher education did not exist down to c. 400 A. D,; it is no wonder that they should have been very scarce also for primary education for a long time. Education was thus mostly imparted by private teachers in private schools. Family priests continued to impart primary education for a fairly long time. From about the 5th century A. D. a great impetus was given to higher education by the founding of a number of public schools and colleges. This must have given an indirect impetus to primary education also; for the less capable products of these institutions may have taken to primary education as a career. Primary teachers, by no means highly qualified for their task, figured in Kashmir society during the 10th century A. D.;² the same may have been the case elsewhere also. Sometimes primary teachers were employed by the rich to educate their family children and the children of other villagers were also allowed to read along with them. If a village had not a rich person to engage a teacher on his own account, a number of guardians used to cooperate in engaging the services of a teacher, each paying according to his ability. In the majority of cases, however, private teachers used to start schools on their own initiative, relying upon the uncertain income of voluntary fees and contributions from the guardians of students. The average income of a teacher in Bengal just before the advent of the British rule was more or less equal to the emoluments of the village accountant :³ the same 1 लिपिशालामुपनीयते स्म कुमारः । तत्र विश्वामित्रो नाम दारकाचार्यः । Lalita-vistāra, Chap. X. 2 Rājataraṅgiṇī, Vol. I, pp. 134 & 196 (Eng. Tr.) 3 Stark, Vernacular Education in Bengal, pp. 28 ff.