ABSTRACT
In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries Gujarat occupied an important place in the economic life of our country. The Jains were then possibly the leading indigenous trading community, closely followed by Hindu Banias and Muslim Bohras. However, little effort has been made to trace their social life, their customs and their relationships with other communities during this period. Some of the reasons why inadequate attention has been paid to the Jains appear to be the inability of the European observers of that period to distinguish sharply between them and the Hindu Banias in their accounts, which have so far continued to be the main basis of our study of the socio-economic history of these centuries. Besides corroborating the above facts, it gives certain additional data relating to the social life of the Jains. The Jains seemed to have close links with craftsmen.
