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

180 EDUCATION IN ANCIENT INDIA [Ch. cultural tradition and who had discontinued Upanayana at this time, were literate. Literacy among the males of the three higher castes must have been hardly more than about 40 percent towards the end of the 8th century A. D. The Shudras, who formed the bulk of the labouring classes, and the untouchables were all illiterate. As a class, women also had ceased to be literate towards the end of the 8th century, as has been shown already. PRIMARY EDUCATION DURING C. 800-1200 A. D. Vernaculars and Primary Education :—Verna- culars began to develop during this period and ordinary men ceased to understand Sanskrit. This must have produced a great change in the curriculum of primary education also. Those who intended to specialise in Sanskrit must have continued to spend a part of their time in early childhood in memorising dictionaries (Koshas) and verbal conjugations and nominal declen- sions. Those however who had no such ambition must have concentrated on the study of vernaculars in the primary stage. Some inscriptions of this period refer to the arrangements made for the teaching of vernaculars in the schools and colleges. A school at Talgund in Mysore state had made provision for the teaching of Canarese in the 12th century A.D.;¹ a college at Narsipur in the same state was providing for the teaching of the vernaculars,—Canarese, Telugu and Marathi,—in 1290 A. D.² If higher colleges were making provision for the teaching of the vernaculars of other provinces also, we can well conclude that 1 E. C., VII, Shikarpur, No. 185. 2 Ibid, Vol. III, Narsipur, No. 27.