探索发现：BBC:古代圣贤:佛祖释迦牟尼 Buddha-6

 Brahmans were responsible for reciting the vedas, an ancient body of divine teachings and hymns in sacred spaces and in people's homes, just as they do today, another key role was to perform sacrifices to persuade the gods to sustain the order of the cosmos and deliver prosperity.

They memorize all the old scriptures, you've seen how the Brahmans here have been just chanting one after the other, they can go on like three or four hours, they memorize all the rituals, they knew what vibrations, what food, how the water should be, how the earth should be, what space is required, they had all the understanding of how to communicate with the gods.

What kind of ritual were they in charge of?

If somebody had died and you need to do the last rites, it was the Brahmans who would come to do it, if there was a drought, you get the Brahman to evoke the rain god, the whole life depend on the priests, the Brahmans who had the knowledge.

That must have given them real power.

They've always dominated the rest, whether you call it the caste system or the different levels, but they had the highest top position, then came the warrior community, the Rajputs, the fighters, the rulers, then came the business community which is the V, and then came the community that did the service, the cobblers, the blacksmith, and that was the Brahman society.