|
168
|
THE BURNING OP WIDOWS book iii
|
||
|
|
|||
|
an example of at Hugly ; this is done in the places near their factories.1
Let
us see now what is the practice along the coast of Coromandel when
women are going to be burnt with the bodies of their deceased husbands.
A large hole of 9 or 10 feet deep, and 25 or 30 feet square, is dug,
into which plenty of wood is thrown, with many drugs to make it burn
quickly. When the hole is well heated, the body of the husband is
placed on the edge, and then his wife comes dancing, and chewing betel,
accompanied by all her relatives and friends, and with the sound of
drums and cymbals. The woman then makes three turns round the hole, and
at each time she embraces all her relatives and friends. When she
completes the third turn the Brahmans throw the body of the deceased
into the fire, and the woman, with her back turned towards the hole, is
pushed by the Brahmans, and falls in backwards. Then all the relatives
throw pots of oil and other drugs of that kind, as I have said is
elsewhere done, so that the bodies may be the sooner consumed. In the
greater part of the same Coromandel coast the woman does not burn
herself with the body of her deceased husband, but allows herself to be
interred, while alive, with him in a hole which the Brahmans dig in the
ground, about 1 foot deeper than the height of the man or woman. They
generally select a sandy spot, and when they have placed the man and
woman in the hole, each of their friends fills a basket of sand, and
throws it on the bodies until the hole is full and heaped over, half a
foot higher than the ground, after which they jump and dance upon it
till they are certain that the woman is smothered.2
1
The exposure of children is said to have been a Vedie practice, but it
merely meant that the child, if a girl, was laid aside, while a boy was
lifted up and acknowledged (Macdonell & Keith, Vedic Index, i. 395 ; ii. 114 f.). Various modes of infanticide are described by Chevers (Manual of Medical Jurisprudence in India, 750
ff.). In stating that in Bengal the excess of children blind of one eye
is due to exposure, Tavernier exagÂgerated the case. Blindness in
Bengal is largely due to climatic causes— glare and dust (Census Report, Bengal, 1901, i. 288 ; 1911, i. 419).
2
Thevenot alludes to the custom of burying widows alive, but says that
when they were covered with clay up to the neck, they were strangled by
the Brahmans (Voyages, 253). This probably gave rise to the tale of Sindbad the Seaman being buried with his dead wife (Burton,
|
|||
|
|
|||