‘Wander Alone Like the Rhinoceros!’: The Solitary, Itinerant Renouncer in Ancient Indian Gāthā-Poetry

The ancient Indian gāthā – a proverbial, succinct type of single-stanza poetry, often collected in thematic sets – became a favoured form of expression among groups of ascetics from the middle to the end of the 1st millennium BCE. This poetry – contrasting with the magico-ritual chant or mantra of the priest and the artistic poem of the aesthete – functions as (self-)instruction for the ascetic/renouncer. Examples include gāthās that exhort him to be as untiring as the Sun in its daily course, or to “wander alone like the rhinoceros!” This chapter delineates the figure of the solitary, wandering renouncer in a selection of Brahmanic, Jaina, and Buddhist ascetic gāthā-verses from that period. Particular attention is given to the use of solar and heroic imagery for describing the ideal renouncer, and how this relates to the real-life conditions of wandering renouncers.

Vedic ritual text, the Aitareyabrāhmaṇa (ch. 7), which is meant for recitation during the royal consecration (rājasūya). Versions of the legend can also be found in other texts. 79 The section of the Aitareyabrāhmaṇa in which this narrative is found appears to have been composed in Videha during the mid 1 st millennium BCE -an area and a period connected to the rise of Buddhism and Jainism. The legend of Rohita and Śunaḥśepa includes a set of five aphoristic verses -gāthās -composed in the classical anuṣṭubh-śloka-metre. Together they form a kind of song, which, although it is untitled in Sanskrit, I will refer to as the "Song of the Wanderer"; it is rather unique in Vedic ritual literature. Before we look at how the Song of the Wanderer is best understood in context of similar thematic sets of gāthā-verses in early Buddhist and Jaina literature, a brief summary of the narrative of Indra and Rohita is necessary.
The story goes that there was once a king, Hariścandra, who had promised to sacrifice his only son, Rohita, to the deity (deva) Varuṇa. When Rohita was 'fit to bear arms' (sāmnāhuka), id est upon reaching manhood, the father decided to perform the sacrifice. Having heard the terrible news, Rohita grabbed his bow and arrows and escaped into the jungle, where he roamed about for a whole year. Meanwhile Hariścandra got sick and Rohita, hearing about his father's misfortune, decided to return home. As he came near the village, however, he was confronted by a brāhmaṇa -the deva Indra in disguise -who presented his message to Rohita in the form of a gāthā: Great is the splendour of him who has exerted himself [śrānta-], so we have heard, o Rohita! Wicked is he who stays among men. Indra is the friend of the wandering man [carant-]. 80 Therefore, the brāhmaṇa exhorted Rohita to wander (cara). Putting his trust in him, Rohita continued his roaming for another year in 79 Such as Śāṅkhayanaśrautasūtra 15.17-27. 80 nānā śrāntāya śrīr astīti rohita śuśruma | pāpo nṛṣadvaro jana indra ic carataḥ sakhā || (Aitareyabrāhmaṇa 7.15.1, translation based on Olivelle 2007:175 (cf. Horsch 1966. Translations are mine, unless stated otherwise. Instead of nṛṣadvaro the Śāṅkhāyanaśrautasūtra has niṣadvaro 'he who sits'. Each verse is followed by the exhortation to wander (caraiveti).
With this gāthā, and the completion of the six years of wandering, the first section of the legend comes to an end. 85 Soon thereafter, we are told, Rohita found a substitute victim for himself, Śunaḥśepa, the son of a sylvan sage, whom he exchanged for a hundred cows. 86 Rohita returned to his father with the new sacrificial victim, which was accepted by Varuṇa. How Śunaḥśepa escaped death by means of his poetic skill is another story.

II. What is ascetic gāthā-poetry?
Before analyzing the Song of the Wanderer, a basic understanding of the nature of gāthā-poetry is a prerequisite. In his seminal work Die vedische Gāthā-und Śloka-Literatur (1966), Paul Horsch argues that gāthā-literature plays an important part in the transformation from Vedic to the early non-Vedic ascetic-renunciant (śramaṇa) traditions during the middle to the end of the 1 st millennium BCE. 87 The gāthā-genre can be seen as an "alternative" literature, existing parallel to the strictly priestly one. In the earliest known Indo-Aryan poetry, the Ṛgvedasaṃhitā, the term gā́thāwhich originally simply meant 'verse' or 'song' -designates a liturgical composition; 88 the same is true of its Avestan counterpart gāϑā. 89 In Vedic India, however, gāthā soon came to refer solely to non-liturgical poetry, since the term mantra -a formula from the Vedic hymn-collections (Saṃhitās) -became synonymous with liturgical verse. It is only during the late Vedic period that one can speak of gāthās as constituting a separate, non-priestly literature, which is not represented in the hymn-collections yet recognized by theologians as common lore and sparsely quoted in their 85 Śāṅkhāyanaśrautasūtra 15.19 adds a seventh year and a sixth verse, in the same style as the previous ones; the first half-line is taken from the fifth verse. 86 It is not said how Rohita managed to acquire a hundred cows; he may have captured them in a raid, as befitting a young warrior (Weller 1956:86;Falk 1984). 87 Horsch 1966:482. 88 Horsch 1966 In Young Avestan the term is used mainly for referring to the five Old Avestan Gāϑās, the 17 hymns or Yasna-chapters attributed to Zaraϑuštra. The metrical characteristic of the Gāϑās, in contrast to the early Vedic gāthā, is their strophic form, each with a fixed number of verse-lines and syllables. prosaic texts, 90 such as the Aitareyabrāhmaṇa's legend of Rohita and Śunaḥśepa. Closely associated with gāthā is the term śloka, 91 which in the post-Vedic period came to designate a specific metric form -the much loved anuṣṭubh -regardless of its content.
From the late Vedic period onwards, gāthā designates a verse of the proverbial, aphoristic type, in which the focus is on content, rather than on composition. When used within a narrative och didactic text, the function of the gāthā is to strengthen or summarize a statement in the prose text. The gāthā is a single-stanza poem; a verse is complete in itself, but it often appears in the texts together with other verses on the same subject, forming thematic sets or "songs", such as the "Song of the Wanderer" or the "Rhinoceros-sutta" (below).
Gāthās in Brahmanic, 92 Buddhist, and Jaina texts should be seen in context of the broader Indian proverbial-gnomic and didactic literature: sayings, aphorisms, maxims, and precepts originating in oral tradition. One of the subgenres of gāthā-literature, ascetic gāthās, became a favoured form of expression among groups of renouncers during the late Vedic and early post-Vedic periods. During this time, there was considerable cultural and intellectual exchange between various ascetic groups. They all seem to have made use of some sort of un-edited, pre-Aśokan, non-sectarian, floating corpus of sayings, similes, ideals, poetic and narrative material, which would explain the numerous shared expressions found in post-Vedic Brahmanic, early Jaina, and Buddhist ascetic 90 Śatapathabrāhmaṇa 11.5.7.10 even mentions gāthā as Vedic subject of study. 91 śloka 'verse of praise', literally 'that which is heard'. See Horsch 1966:1, 219, 223-229, 306;Gonda 1975:405-407. 92 In the term "Brahmanic" I include both the "Vedic Brahmanic" tradition (texts from the Vedic period, circa 1500-500 BCE) and the "neo-Brahmanic" tradition (texts from the post-Vedic period); both (in contrast to Jainism and Buddhism) regard the Vedas as authoritative and bráhman (the transcendent force that animates the ritual word and action; the Absolute) as an important concept. Thus, by "Brahmanic" I do not refer to the title brāhmaṇa ('relating to bráhman'), since this title is used to describe oneself both in Brahmanic texts (often in the sense of 'priest' or as member of a hereditary class) and in early Jaina and Buddhist texts (often in the sense of 'ascetic'). Cf. McGovern 2019. poetry. 93 The gāthās in the Song of the Wanderer are uniform, although they neither give the impression of being the work of a single poet, nor of being invented for the legend of Rohita and Śunaḥśepa. 94 Rather, they have sprung from the "well-spring" of ancient Indian ascetic poetry. This poetry is decidedly un-scholarly, concerning itself not with complex metaphysical theory, but with the ideal renouncer's way of life and his attitude to the world.

III. Solar and royal themes
The theme of kingship runs through much of the legend of Rohita and Śunaḥśepa and its gāthās. The first gāthā in the Song of the Wanderer promises śrī -the 'splendour' associated with the prospering householder and with the righteous ruler -to the man who 'exerts' himself (√ŚRAM), isolated from other men. And in the final stanza we have the word śreman 'pre-eminence, distinction', which is etymologically and semantically related to śrī. There is also the fourth stanza's use of imagery derived from the dice-game (which is played in the royal consecration, during which the legend of Rohita and Śunaḥśepa is recited), promising the winning throw (Kṛta) to the wanderer.
The theme of kingship is, moreover, seen in that Rohita himself is a prince or kṣatriya (member of the warrior aristocracy, ruler) and his guide none other than the kṣatriya-deity Indra, disguised as a brāhmaṇa. The latter term may in this case signify one who observes celibacy, since it was common among śramaṇas to identify the ascetic as a brāhmaṇa. 95 The statement "Indra is the friend of the wanderer" (indra ic carataḥ sakhā) in the first gāthās recalls Indra as "the friend of munis" (muni 'mute, ascetic sage') in a much earlier text: Ṛgvedasaṃhitā 8.17.14. The name Rohita ('ruddy') is itself closely connected to kingship: in the 13 th book 93 See Charpentier 1921:43;Rau 1963;Horsch 1966:453-454;Bollée 1980;Nakamura 1983;Norman 1983:58-59, 63f., 78, 82. In the Dhammapada "small groups of verses, linked together by refrain, structure, or metre, clearly make small poems whose pre-existence is shown by the fact that they occur in the same form in other traditions as well." (Norman 1983:59) 94  of the Śaunakīyasaṃhitā the title Rohita appears to designate a ruler ascending to power, as well as the ruddy, rising Sun, personified by the king. Verse 13.4.1 alludes to the movement of an unnamed subject, who goes to the heavenly light as Savitṛ, perhaps referring to the progression of the Sun, the king, and/or the itinerant ascetic. 96 A common idea in Vedic, epic, and later literature, is that both the ascetic and the king possess the solar characteristics of heat (tapas), fiery lustre (varcas, tejas), and splendour (śrī). The connections between Indra, the Sun, and itinerant ascetics (brahmacārin, keśin, muni, vrātya) have been explored by Moreno Dore (2015), in addition to whose observations I wish to point to the image of the solitary wandering Sun in two more passages. First, the episode from the "Book of the Forest" in the Mahābhārata, in which the deva Dharma, in disguise of a yakṣa ("nature spirit"), presents riddles to the illustrious king Yudhiṣṭhira, who has gone into exile, in order to test the king's wisdom. One of the riddles goes: "What is it that travels alone, who is reborn, what is the remedy against cold, and what is the great sowing(-ground)?" Yudhiṣṭhira answers correctly: The Sun wanders alone [eka-vicarati], the Moon is reborn, fire is the remedy against cold, Earth is the great sowing(-ground). 97 The dialogue continues to praise the kind of ideals found in ascetic texts. 98 Note that, as in the legend of Rohita and Śunaḥśepa, we are dealing with a royal personage in forest exile (a recurring motif in ancient Indian literature): Yudhiṣṭhira. The royal context of the yakṣa's riddle is even more obvious when we understand that its origin is to be sought in the Vedic royal horse-sacrifice (aśvamedha). In the riddle-contest (brahmodya) of this grand 96  ritual the brahmán-priest puts his question to the hotṛ-priest, who provides the same answer as Yudhiṣṭhira does in the epic. 99 The message of the Song of the Wanderer, as we have seen, is that one should seek the fortune, essence, and fruit that come from a roaming lifestyle. Rohita lives as a wanderer temporarily, and does this within a sacrificial context, which is typical of the Vedic ritual texts, whereas the later Brahmanic and non-Vedic gāthās, discussed below, express the ideal of the permanent wandering. Patrick Olivelle suggests that the Song of the Wanderer echoes the earlier (semi-)nomadism of Indo-Aryan tribes, who would alternate between life on the move (yoga 'the yoke, harnessing', war and raiding) and the peaceful, settled life (kṣema). 100 Roaming outside human settlement -as hunter, warrior, raider, or ascetic wanderer -was attributed greater spiritual, social, and economic value than living among men. 101 Both Olivelle and Horsch 102 have suggested that the Song of the Wanderer points forward to the ideal of wandering mendicants or ascetics. The terms used by Indra to urge Rohita to exert himself (śrānta, śrama, śramaṇa) derive from the verbal root (√) ŚRAM 'to toil, exert oneself', which is used for the disciplined life of a Vedic sacrificer during his ritual of initiation, and is found in the terms śramaṇa 'ascetic, mendicant' and āśrama 'hermitage, way of life'.
Thus, in the mentioned passages, the Sun is characterized by its solitary procession: (vi)carati from √CAR, which is used both in the sense 'to wander, go', and 'to live (in a certain way), follow a discipline'. The same root is used in the Song of the Wanderer 99 sū́rya ekākī́ carati candrámā jāyate púnaḥ | agnír dhimásya bheṣajáṃ bhū́mir āvápanaṃ mahát || (45)(46) Similarly, but in prose, in Taittirīyabrāhmaṇa 3.9.5: asau vā́ ādityá ekākī́ carati téja evā́ 'varundhe "It is yonder Sun, indeed, that moves alone [ekākī́ √CAR]. (Consequently) it is fiery energy he (= the sacrificer) thus obtains." (translation by Dumont 1948:481) And Śatapathabrāhmaṇa 13.2.6.10: asau vā́ ādityá ekākī́ caraty eṣá brahmavarcasám brahmavarcasám evāsmiṃs tád dhattaḥ "It is the Sun that walks alone [ekākī́ √CAR]. This is bráhman-lustre; the two (priests) bestow bráhman-lustre on him (= the sacrificer)." Indra, identified with the Sun, is wide-striding in Ṛgvedasaṃhitā 10.29.4 (Śaunakīyasaṃhitā 20.76.4). 100 Olivelle 2007 (cara, carataḥ, caran). A wandering lifestyle is attributed to various ascetic figures already in early and middle Vedic texts, but in contrast to the later ascetic gāthā-literature, asceticism in early Vedic texts is not connected to a specific genre of (proverbial) poetry. Instead, earlier Vedic songs about ascetics typically take the form of laudatory texts full of cryptic references and expressions. One such hymn is that of the celibate student or brahmacārin in the Śaunakīyasaṃhitā: The Interestingly, in context of the link between Rohita and Indra in the later legend, the brahmacārin is associated, or even identified, with Indra. This is because of the brahmacārin's heroic qualities, 104 but also because Indra roams alone: in Ṛgvedasaṃhitā 3.30.4 we learn that Indra goes about alone (eka + √CAR), smashing obstacles. Indra is also designated as eka in passages which stress his heroism and strength: 105 ekavīra 'lone hero' is an epithet given to him. 106 In Ṛgvedasaṃhitā 1.165.3 the Maruts, who always appear as a group, ask Indra why he travels alone. In the Jaiminīyabrāhmaṇa, in the chapter on the agnihotra, the epithet ekavīra is attributed to the Sun, which in turn is identified with Indra: " Scholars have argued that the Vedic brahmacārin 'he who wanders/lives with brahman' is a forerunner of the later renouncer. 108 Two common terms for 'renouncer', parivrājaka and pravrajita, literally mean 'he who wanders about' and 'he who goes forth (into homelessness)'. 109 Originally, renouncers would wander about constantly, except during the monsoon, as the heavy rains made travelling too difficult. The ideal in Brahmanic renunciant traditions was to travel alone, though it is questionable if this was actually common practise (we will return to this below). This ideal is expressed in an anuṣṭubh-śloka from the Manusmṛti, a version of which also appears in the Mahābhārata: Verily, he should always wander alone [eka √CAR], without any companion, in order to achieve success. Recognizing that success is for the solitary, he will not forsake (anyone) and he will not be forsaken (by anyone The same ideal is found in the Saṃnyāsopaniṣads, a collection of later Brahmanic texts on renunciation. The Nāradaparivrājakopaniṣad, 108 Oberlies 1997. 109 Shiraishi 1996:103-104, 125-126). Identical to Mahābhārata 12.237.4cd-5b except 5a which has ekaś carati yaḥ paśyan "he wanders alone, who is seeing (that success comes to the solitary)" (cf. 12.237.7, 22). Similarly Mahābhārata 12.308.28 when Janaka says: "Free from passion, I wander/live alone, standing on the highest path" (muktarāgaś carāmy ekaḥ pade paramake sthitaḥ). According to 12.234.9 one should "wander alone in the forest" (araṇye vicaraikākī). See also 1.86.5 below, which is almost identical with the Jaina Uttarajjhayaṇa 15.16. 111 eka eva cared dharmaṃ nāsti dharme sahāyatā | kevalaṃ vidhim āsādya sahāyaḥ kiṃ kariṣyati || (Mahābhārata 12.186.31) for example, proclaims that "alone, indeed, shall a mendicant wander". 112 And according to the Pañcamāśramavidhi, a man who decides to become a skyclad ascetic must abandon absolutely everything and be prepared to be regarded as a madman by society: Let him wander alone [ekākī saṃ-√CAR] on the Earth, as if he were a fool, a lunatic, or a goblin. 113 One can also mention a quote in the 11 th century "Collection of Ascetic Laws" (Yatidharmasamuccaya) by Yādava, just to illustrate the consistency of this ideal in Brahmanic ascetic traditions from different periods in time. A verse quoted from Medhātithi, in which the ascetic is compared with the constant and unhindered movement of the Sun, echoes the ideal found in ancient texts: (The wandering ascetic) is seen in one place in the morning, in another place at noon, and in yet another at sunset. Like the Sun, he should remain without a home and free from attachment. 114 The same text, quoting Yama: Totally unfettered, let him always wander alone [ekākī vi-√CAR], without a companion; for when a man wanders alone his path becomes smooth, but it thwarts him when he does not. 115 To sum up: the notion of the Sun as a prototypical solitary wanderer, which we find in the Song of the Wanderer, 116  to the earlier Vedic tradition and is continued in the Mahābhārata. It makes its appearance in a royal context (the legend of Rohita and Śunaḥśepa told in the rājasūya, the riddle-contest in the aśvamedha, and the trial of king Yudhisthira), which is understandable when we know that the Sun is also a prototypical lone hero (ekavīra) and ruler. The combination of eka + √CAR 'to wander alone', which is used for the Sun in the riddle-verse, also applies to the early Vedic Indra and to the Brahmanic renouncer.

IV. The solitary Jaina hero
As we turn to the Jaina material, we find that gāhā (the Prakrit equivalent of gāthā) is typically used to designate popular verses with religious content, more seldom for the ascetic poetry found in Śvetāmbara canonical texts. 117 Although the term gāhā (gāthā) in general has been superseded by the term sutta (Sanskrit sūtra), the type of Jaina literature dealt with below is, with regard to both content and style, fully in line with the definition of ascetic gāthā-poetry given above.
An important text for our understanding of the early Jaina mendicant ideal is the 15 th chapter of the Uttarajjhayaṇa, which Jarl Charpentier refers to as a "Schatzkammer altjainistischer Spruch-und Legendenpoesie". 118 It consists of sixteen stanzas on the perfect mendicant (bhikkhu). 119 His life is one of simplicity and harshness: he must endure heat and cold, gadflies and mosquitos; 120 he must accept any kind of tasty or tasteless food, even from the household of a low-status donor. 121 The forest, through which the mendicant fares, is filled with dangerous beasts and fearful sounds, but he shall pay no attention to any of that. 122 The 7 th and 8 th stanzas, listing practises that are forbidden to the Jaina 117 Horsch 1966:218. In Uttarajjhayaṇa 31.13 the first book of the Sūyagaḍa is known as "The Sixteen Gāthās", since they form sixteen chapters of verses (except the last chapter). 118 Tatia & Kumar 1981:90) 127 aśilpajīvī nagṛhaś ca nityaṃ jitendriyaḥ sarvato vipramuktaḥ | anokasārī laghur alpacāraś caran deśān ekacaraḥ sa bhikṣuḥ || "He who lives off no craft, is always homeless, has conquered his senses, is entirely liberated, does not frequent houses, travels lightly on short journeys, and wanders alone [ekacaraḥ] through the countries -he is a mendicant [bhikṣu-]." (Mahābhārata 1.86.5) 128 ega eva care lāḍhe abhibhūya parīsahe | gāme vā nagare vāvi nigame vā rāyahāṇie || (Uttarajjhayaṇa 2.9, translation based on Jacobi 1895:12). The formula eka eva √CAR in this verse is found also in the verses from Manusmṛti and Nāradaparivrājakopaniṣad quoted above.
He should sit down, alone, in a burial place, a deserted home, or at the root of a tree, without moving, and he should not drive away anyone. 129 Besides the theme of solitary wandering, there is use of royal imagery in Jaina ascetic texts, akin to the that of the Vedic tradition. The bhikkhu is compared with royal beings like the elephant, the lion, the Sun, Sakka (Indra), and so on. 130 Like a war-elephant at the frontline crushes the enemy, so does the heroic ascetic in self-control conquer his inner foe. 131 The renouncer's solitary lifestyle (egacariyā) 132 is known as jinakalpa 'the practise of the conqueror', 133 and has its exemplum in the 'conqueror' (Sanskrit jina) Mahāvīra Vardhamāna -the title mahāvīra means 'great hero' -who was the most recent tīrthaṅkara ('ford-maker', one who re-establishes the Jaina path of liberation by crossing the river/ocean of saṃsāra). We read in the Āyāra and the Sūyagaḍa that when Mahāvīra 'went forth' (pavvaie) as a renouncer he lived alone (ega-√CAR). 134 It was only after years of solitary wandering, and after attaining supreme enlightenment in meditation, that Mahāvīra began to surround himself with disciples, though the Sūyagaḍa is keen to point out that his inner solitude was always kept intact. 135 A passage in a later text, the Jiṇacaritta or 'Biography of the Heroes', based on older material, describes Mahāvīra as being, among other things, "alone like the rhinoceros" (khaggivisāṇaṃ va ega-jae -see the Buddhist gāthās below), "effulgent like the Sun" (sūro iva ditta-tee), free as the bird in the air, valorous like the male elephant, and his senses drawn in like the turtle's limbs -all of them common similes in ascetic literature. This is first 129  stated in prose and then, in some manuscripts, summarized in two gāhā-verses. 136 The extreme brevity of the two gāhās make them, unlike most gāthās, difficult to understand without prior knowledge of what each object represents (given by the oral tradition that is reflected, we must assume, in the prose 137 ): Vessel, shell, soul, sky, wind, and autumnal water; lotus-leaf, turtle, bird, rhinoceros, and bhāruṇḍa-bird.
Elephant, bull, lion, king of mountains, and unshaken ocean; Moon, Sun, gold, Earth, and well-kindled fire. 138 A corresponding enumeration in prose is found in the Ovavāiya, but here it refers to the mendicants at the time of Mahāvīra: they were "solitary like the rhinoceros" (khaggi-visāṇaṃ va egajāyā), "effulgent like the Sun" (sūro iva ditta-teyā), and so on. 139 In the Sūyagaḍa, likewise, Mahāvīra is likened to the Sun and to fire: Omniscient, wandering about [√CAR] without a home, crossing the river (of saṃsāra), wise, and of unlimited perception, the highest one (= Mahāvīra) glows [/becomes heated] like the Sun, and he illuminates the darkness like a brilliant fire. 140 The image of the ascetic as glowing or becoming heated through asceticism (√TAP), like the Sun, can be compared with the solar qualities of the Vedic wandering ascetics. 136 imesiṃ payāṇaṃ doṇṇi saṃgahaṇa-gāhāo "Of these words there are two summarizing verses." (Jiṇacaritta 118) See Jacobi 1879:28-29, 63. 137 Cf. the enumeration of representative objects given in a śloka by sage Bodhya in Mahābhārata 12.171.61, which is explained in another six ślokas in the Bombay edition (12.178.8-13).

V. Pali verses on wandering alone like the rhinoceros
Finally, as we come to the early Buddhist literature, it becomes clear that gāthā-poetry was important to the saṅgha founded by Buddha Śākyamuni. The Dhammapada and many verses in the Suttanipāta, Itivuttaka, Udāna,Theragāthā,141 and the Jātakastanzas, are gāthā-literature. Among these, the Suttanipāta's Khaggavisāṇasutta, Uragasutta, and Munisutta (possibly identical with the Munigāthā referred to in the Aśoka inscription 142 ) are of particular interest, since they outline the ideal renouncer. According to Upali Sramon (2011), Pali literature makes a basic distinction between gāthā as authoritative verse-composition, and kāveyya (Sanskrit kāvya) as mere artistic poetry, the making of poems or poetry as business. The latter is a forbidden art for the monk 143 (similar to the arts forbidden for a Jaina mendicant, as we saw above), whereas the former (gāthās) need not have any poetic qualities, as they are only versified for memorisation. 144 In this context one can mention the verses attributed to Vaṅgīsa, who, prior to becoming a wandering ascetic of Śākyamuni's order, was a wandering artistic poet: Intoxicated with skill in the poetic art, formerly we wandered from village to village, from town to town. Then we saw the Awakened One, gone to the far shore beyond all (worldly conditioned) phenomena. 145 The prevalent metre of the Pali canon is the anuṭṭubha (Sanskrit anuṣṭubh) or siloka (śloka), "which has a great deal of flexibility, and seems to be equally well adapted to aphorism, question 141 Some verses in the Theragāthās and Therīgāthās are rather artistic and lyrical -the authors took over imagery and conventions of contemporary kāvya and secular poetry -and therefore cannot be considered ascetic gāthā-literature (cf. Norman 1983:75-76;Lienhard 1984a:76-77 and answer, narrative, and epic." 146 It has been argued that the anthology Suttanipāta is as close to the teachings of Śākyamuni himself as we can get. The following points suggest that the text is "archaic", according to Nāgapriya (2014) -and, I would add, belongs to ascetic poetry: Relative absence of formulas; (re)definition of terms from the existing socio-religious discourse, such as brāhmaṇa; 147 emphasis is on behaviour, rather than metaphysics (virtues and qualities of the renouncer, rather than doctrine); and relative absence of systematized teachings. Some Pali suttas use refrain as "organizing principle", mainly for mnemonic reasons, but are free from repetition of systematized doctrines and enumerations typical of later texts. 148 The ideal of solitary wandering or a solitary lifestyle (ekacariyā) 149 is best expressed in the Khaggavisāṇasutta or "Rhinoceros-sutta" (Suttanipāta 1.3 or verses 35-75), also found in Gandhari 150 and Buddhist Hybrid-Sanskrit (the Khaḍgaviṣāṇagāthā in the Mahāvastu). It has been suggested that the Khaggavisāṇasutta was originally an independent, and perhaps not specifically Buddhist, text. 151 The refrain encourages the renouncer to "wander alone like the rhinoceros" (eko care khaggavisāṇakappo) 152 , a simile also taken up by the Jainas, as we saw. This agrees with other animal exempla: the lion wandering alone (sīhaṃ … eka-√CAR) 153 , or the solitary (senior male) elephant who has left the herd. 154 The lion and the elephant are connected to royal and heroic imagery, as in this stanza from the Dhammapada: if one does not find a worthy companion, one should wander alone [eka-√CAR], like a king who has renounced the conquered realm, or like an elephant in the elephant-forest. 155 The same goes for the Khaggavisāṇasutta: the renouncer should roam alone, fearless like the lion 'the king of beasts' (rājā migānaṃ), elephant, or rhinoceros: 156 Like an elephant, with a massive back, spotted, noble, who has left the herd, in order to dwell according to his will in the forest, one should wander alone [eka-√CAR] like the rhinoceros. 157 Friends, family, and women must be forsaken, 158 for it is impossible to attain emancipation while enjoying company. 159 Yet, Richard Salomon argues, the "overall message of the sutta is not that one must have no companions at all, but rather that one should choose one's companions very carefully for their moral and spiritual merits." 160 Toward the end of the sutta, friendship (metta) is actually praised, but it is the friendliness toward all beings, the virtues of equanimity and non-violence, which comes 154  from detachment, not the friendship that means attachment to another person. If it is not possible to find an exceptionally noble companion one should roam about in solitude, like a king who has renounced his kingdom, 161 which reflects a recurrent motif in ancient Indian literature: the king who gives up his throne in order to seek mokṣa. Royal imagery may also hide behind verse 42: 'he who is in the four directions' (cātuddisa) refers to one who advances in all directions of space -the renouncer who is free to roam as he pleases, like the rhinoceros -but it could also reflect the Vedic ideal of the king as a conqueror of the four directions of space (digvijaya): (At home in) all directions [of space], unhindered anywhere, being satisfied with one thing or another, a bearer of dangers, fearless, one should wander alone [eka-√CAR] like the rhinoceros. 162 Gāthā 48 of the Khaggavisāṇasutta uses the delicate simile of two bracelets, clashing against each other: 163 when a girl wears more than one bracelet they clash and make noise as she moves her arm, whereas the single bracelet remains quiet. This signifies that company should be avoided, as it leads to unnecessary talk and disturbances. The gāthā belongs to a set of verses known from the Pali Jātaka 408, which deals with four royal, pre-Śākyamuni paccekabuddhas, who realise the impermanence of everything in the world and renounce it. 164 According to Dhivan Jones, the existence of the Khaggavisāṇasutta in Pali, Gandhari, and Buddhist Hybrid-Sanskrit indicates its popularity among bhikkhus, but "the attribution from early times of the rhinoceros stanzas to the 161 Khaggavisāṇasutta 46, as in Dhammapada 329 above. 162 cātuddiso appaṭigho ca hoti | santussamāno itarītarena | parissayānaṃ sahitā achambhī | eko care khaggavisāṇakappo || (Khaggavisāṇasutta 42, translation by Salomon 2000:174-175) 163 disvā suvaṇṇassa pabhassarāni | kammāraputtena suniṭṭhitāni | saṃghaṭṭamānāni duve bhujasmiṃ | eko care khaggavisāṇakappo || "Having seen the two golden (bracelets), brilliant, well-made by the smith's son, clashing against each other on the arm, one should wander alone like the rhinoceros." (Khaggavisāṇasutta 48) 164 Norman 1983:82;Salomon 2000:8-9; cf. Mahāvastu 1.301. On the debated term and concept of paccekabuddha see, for example, Anālayo 2010. paccekabuddhas [who lived long ago], evident in the Mahāvastu as well as in the Apadāna and Cūlaniddesa [Pali commentary], suggests that the solitary lifestyle recommended by the stanzas seemed to the early Buddhists not to be an ideal to which they could practically aspire." 165 Finally, one can mention the Munisutta (Suttanipāta 207-221), which characterises the muni as a solitary wanderer and emphasises the necessity of leaving domestic life, echoing the sentiment of the Vedic Song of the Wanderer. 166 There are similar passages in the Moneyyasutta (Suttanipāta 699-723), the Arindamajātaka of the Mahāvastu, 167 Āryaśūra's Jātakamālā, 168 and the Theragāthās. The latter include, for example, a stanza attributed to Sītavaniya praising the solitary forest mendicant, 169 as well as verses attributed to Tissakumāra Ekavihāriya 'lone-dweller'. The latter describe the eremitical, sylvan life as nothing but pleasant and peaceful 170bear in mind the lyrical element in some Theragāthās -not harsh and physically painful as in the more realistic Uttarajjhayaṇa (15.4) and Khaggavisāṇasutta (52).

VI. How much of this reflects the historical reality?
Now, the reader may wonder how much of all this high talk of living in solitude and walking constantly reflects historical reality? This is not easy to determine. We know that there were no monasteries in India when the Buddhist and Jaina ascetic orders were formed, and the texts describe how Śākyamuni, Mahāvīra, and their disciples visited and taught in various parks and similar localities. 171 When we acknowledge the similarities between the Pali/Prakrit gāthās/gāhās and the Song of the Wanderer, it seems probable that by the mid 1 st millennium BCE the ideal of the solitary wandering ascetic was already firmly established. From this time, especially towards the end of the 1 st millennium BCE, various ascetic groups (Buddhist, Jaina, Brahmanic) shared this ideal. Both Śākyamuni and Mahāvīra organized their disciples in orders -perhaps because, as Stanley Tambiah writes, the personal quest of the renouncer was thought to be best undertaken in a community of like-minded. 172 In a monastic environment it becomes necessary to find a space where one can be alone -if not physically then at least mentally and spiritually. Viveka 'seclusion' is highly esteemed in early Buddhist texts. 173 Śākyamuni differentiated between physical/outer and spiritual/inner solitude, the latter being more important, whereas the former could be realized temporarily. 174 "Canonical texts describe monks who had not reached the stage of Arahant, as well as great disciples and the Buddha himself, living alone at times, or with one, two or a few companions". 175 The solitary wandering mendicant clearly contrasts with the bhikkhu who stays permanently at a monastery. The contrast is also stark between ascetic gāthā-poetry and Buddhist monastic literature, which presents the monk as "caught in a web of social and ritual obligations". 176 The domestication of monks is partly related to the influence of Buddhist lay people, who seek the merit that comes from supporting monks; for it is in the laity's interest that monks are easily accessible in permanently settled communities. 177 Daniel Boucher describes domestication and ascetic reform as a recurring pattern in monastic culture; the solitary or "eremitical" ideal never loses its attractiveness for new generations of ascetics: Buddhist reclusion has long struggled between two poles: the untamed renunciant on the outermost fringes of human civilization, an ascetic who earned his reputation from years of austerity; and the domesticated monk, sedentary and respectable, perhaps scholarly, but more often a ritual specialist attuned to the needs of the laity. These two poles, of course, are essentially coterminous with Weber's charismatic and bureaucratic modes of leadership. … [I]t was the very success of wilderness-dwelling monks in acquiring patronage that eventually compromised this ascetic thrust. This dialectic -reform, domestication, and renewed reform -is a recurring pattern in monastic culture everywhere. 178 It seems highly likely that the mendicant ideal, expressed in the gāthās I have presented, reflects the real-life conditions of many ascetics around the mid 1 st millennium BCE: they were wandering about alone or in small groups, from place to place, except during the rainy season. The earliest Buddhist order has been described as "a dispersed body of wandering hermits". 179 We should bear in mind that the ascetic poetry, although expressing high ideals, 180 discards poetic refinery and imagination; the gāthās 176 179 Dutt 1924:183;similarly Nakamura 1987:59;Bronkhorst 1993:99-100;Shiraishi 1996:160;Bailey & Mabbett 2003:165-168. 180 Shulman sees the Khaggavisāṇasutta not as "an historical statement, but an idealized picture" of what "the author(s) felt the life of a recluse could be like. " (2012:391) are not intended to be mere words, but to function as guidance and self-instruction for one seeking the highest goal. Moreover, realistic botanical and faunal references in the verses, as well as references to vagabond-professions, suggest direct experience of life on road and trail. It is not difficult to imagine the easily memorized verses of the Song of the Wanderer, or the Khaggavisāṇasutta, being recited by ascetics while on the move.
As time went by, the ideal of solitary wandering became increasingly distanced from the real-life of Buddhist monks, as monasteries were built, and was viewed with nostalgia or projected onto a pre-Śākyamuni age of paccekabuddhas. Yet, from time to time, there appeared reformers who reacted against the domestication of the ascetic order and sought a more eremitical or mobile way of life. To some extent, the Brahmanic and Jaina renouncer-traditions were more successful than the Buddhist one in keeping alive itinerancy. 181 Even today, Indian sādhus spend much of their life on the road; they tend to spend their first period as sādhus travelling, then settle down at some pilgrimage-site and form congregations, rather than live as solitary wanderers. 182 Within Jainism, a more settled lifestyle developed around temple-complexes, while sylvan mendicants (vanavāsīs) continued to be wanderers. Today, although Mahāvīra's solitary lifestyle is seen as ideal, bhikkhus usually live in groups (gaṇas). Except during the rainy season, when they stay at shelters, Jaina mendicants walk tirelessly from one locality to another. 183

VII. Final words
One can conclude that there are profound similarities between late Vedic, neo-Brahmanic, early Jaina, and early Buddhist gāthā-poetry on the benefits of wandering alone (eka + √CAR). Not only would Indra's "Song of the Wanderer" fit fairly well among the gāthās of the Suttanipāta or the Uttarajjhayaṇa, but 181 Olivelle states that in the medieval period the ideal of ceaseless wandering was maintained, even when most ascetics resided in monasteries (1995:18; 2007:177-178). 182 Hausner 2007:95-107. 183 Caillat 1989:101. the role of Indra, too, brings to mind the Buddhist and Jaina Indra (Śakra, Sakka, sometimes in the disguise of a brāhmaṇa), as tester, friend, even worshipper, of ascetics. Since Rohita is a kṣatriya on the threshold of adulthood, it is only fitting that the prototypical kṣatriya Indra establishes a relationship with him, but in addition to that we should recognize the common traits of warrior and ascetic -for, as we have seen, already in the early Vedic period Indra is associated with the lone hero and the ascetic. The common traits here are heroic conquest (exertion on the battlefield and in self-overcoming) and solar attributes. The Sun functions as prototype of both the solitary wanderer/ ascetic and the hero/ruler. The spatial movement of the Sun signifies conquest and tireless exertion. 184 The attributes of king and hero are projected on the renouncer as having unlimited spatial freedom and as spiritual conqueror (jina, vīra). The concept of digvijaya or 'conquest of the quarters of space' derives from the Vedic royal ritual, in which a tour in the corners of the land is undertaken by the victorious kṣatriya. In traditional hagiographies of Ādi-Śaṅkarācārya, this term is applied to his metaphysical conquest of India's four corners, as renouncer and scholar, which demonstrates the "complementarity of royal and ascetic paradigms in traditional India." 185 The physical solitude of the ideal renouncer, and his detachment from society -though dependent on it for his bodily sustenance -mirrors his ultimate goal: nirvāṇa, mokṣa, also known as kaivalya, which translates as 'absolute isolation '. 186 This goal can only be attained individually, not collectively. 187 Paradoxical though it may seem, the homeless, wandering renouncer, engaged in nearly constant movement in the spatial world, is precisely the person who is supposed to have attained a state of 184 Olivelle 2007:186. There is a śloka attributed to Bhartṛhari which compares a solitary hero, who conquers all land touched by his feet, with the Sun, whose rays reach the entire Earth (Nītiśataka 108 in Kāle & Gurjar; Miscellaneous 15 in Gopalachariar). 185  true rest. His course is "trackless". 188 The opposite of the sagely renouncer is the ignorant man who feels at home in this world; he too 'wanders about' (√BHRAM), but in circles 189 -"bound, revolving like a wheel (in movement)" 190 , in "the circular path of birth and death" 191 -unable, the texts assert, to make the transsaṃsāric leap.