Among Other Buddhistic Peoples "Gotama" And "Gotama Buddha" Are The More Frequent Designations.

It is not easy to account for the rise of the surname Gotama in the Sakya family, as Oldenberg

Acknowledges. He says that "the Sakyas, in accordance with the custom of Indian noble families, had borrowed it from one of the ancient Vedic bard families." Dr. Davids ("Buddhism," p. 27) says: "The family name was certainly Gautama," adding in a note, "It is a curious fact that Gautama is still the family name of the Rajput chiefs of Nagara, the village which has been identified with Kapilavastu." Dr. Eitel says that "Gautama was the sacerdotal name of the Sakya family, which counted the ancient rishi Gautama among its ancestors." When we proceed, however, to endeavour to trace the connexion of that Brahmanical rishi with the Sakya house, by means of 1323, 1468, 1469, and other historical works in Nanjio's Catalogue, we soon find that Indian histories have no surer foundation than the shifting sand; - see E. H., on the name Sakya, pp. 108, 109. We must be content for the present simply to accept Gotama as one of the surnames of the Buddha with whom we have to do.

[10] See chap. vi, note 5. It is there said that the prediction of Maitreya's succession to the Buddhaship was made to him in the Tushita heaven. Was there a repetition of it here in the Deer-park, or was a prediction now given concerning something else?

[11] Nothing seems to be known of this naga but what we read here.

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