fell into confusion, and were in danger of becoming extinct. It was necessary to record them in writing, and this was done at the Council of Valabhi in Gujarat in 454 or 467 a. d. The operations of the council

resulted in the redaction of the Jain canon in the form in which we find it at the present day.

Besides these facts and traditions, inscriptions have been discovered on the pedestals of Jain statues at Mathura which prove that the Svetambara sect existed in the first century a. d.

Such is the substance of the evidence on which it is contended that the Jain religion is coaeval with Buddhism, and not an offshoot from that religion. From