The Antiquities of Orissa v1.c10.70

Language: English

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The prevailing character of the ordinary female dress is very much like in the three places, and Mr. Fergusson's description of Sāñcī and Amarāvatī, apply eqally to Orissa. "The costume of the women", he says, "is difficult to describe, though this is principally in consequence of its scantiness. Both at Sāñcī and Amarāvatī, the women always wear enormous bangles about the ankles and wrists,⁴³ and generally strings of beads round the neck, but their body clothing is generally limited to a bead belt round the body below the waist. From this belt slips of cloth are sometimes suspended, more generally at the sides or behind than in front, and sometimes also a cloth worn something like the *dhuti* of the male sex is also added, but when that is the case, it is represented in the sculptures generally as absolutely transparent".⁴⁴ It may be questioned, however, as to whether these habits were really the prevailing costumes of the country at the time, or only the conventional modes of representing the female form. Mr. Fergusson, who has devoted his attention for some time to Indian antiquity, is disposed to accept the first branch of the alternative, and it is certainly not easy to question the testimony of authentic graven stones. That testimony, however, is in direct conflict with the evidence of equally authentic written records. The passage from the *Rigveda* quoted above (p.

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[78] ) in which Uṣā is compared to "a youthful bride before her husband, uncovering, smiling, her bosom in his presence", depicts a peculiarity of Indian female dress, which it would be difficult to conceive, had altogether disappeared from the land when the sculptures were incised, and that a bead girdle was the only attire for the body left even to queens and princesses; when improvements in other respects of social life were marked and progressing; when people lived in two and three-storied houses of brick and stone, such as the Sāñcī bas-reliefs represent; when they drove about in carriages and wagons; freely wrought in gold, silver, copper and iron; and manufactured enough of woven fabrics of a superior quality, such as were exported to and greatly prized in the, for the time, highly civilized countries of the West. The veil, the bodice, and body-clothes, are repeatedly mentioned in the *Rāmāyaṇa* and the *Mahābhārata*; and both in the Hindu and the Buddhist codes of law and morality, modesty of dress in women is everywhere insisted upon as a matter of paramount importance. In the ancient code of laws by Śaṅkha, there is an ordinance which says, "Let no woman go out of the house without permission; nor without a sheet over her dress; nor should she be allowed to run or walk very fast; nor speak with male strangers, unless they be tradesmen, hermits, old people, or medical practitioners;

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nor allow her navel to be seen: she should be so dressed that her clothing should hang down to the ankles; and the breasts should never be exposed".⁴⁵ Gobhila enjoins that "women should always wear a sheet, the Grecian *peplos*, or the Roman *palla* over their body-clothes".⁴⁶ Hārīta says, "the first duty of woman (in the morning) is to bathe and put on (clean) clothes"⁴⁷; and among the most important daily duties of woman, Ṛṣyaśṛṅga enumerates, "cleanliness, attention to the duties of the house, the polish of the household utensils, bathing, dressing, plaiting the hair in braids, and putting flowers thereon".⁴⁸ Other authorities are equally particular in this respect, and everywhere the most important duty enjoined on husbands and relatives is to supply good clothing to the ladies of one's house.

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Manu even goes the length of prohibiting husbands from looking at their wives when engaged in the mysteries of their toilette, and of denouncing the sight of nude females as sinful.⁴⁹ The veil, as a mark of propriety and modesty before seniors and strangers, is everywhere insisted upon, and this idea is carried to the ridiculous extent of prohibiting the offering of the funeral cake to a grandfather without first covering the cake to the mother with *kuśa* grass, as emblematic of her veil, for even in spirit she should not appear before her father-in-law with her face uncovered.⁵⁰ In the case of men not only is nudity prohibited, but even a single garment is held [ 86 ] insufficient for propriety. Manu forbids a single garment when at meals,⁵¹ and the *Viṣṇu Purāṇa* ordains that "a man must neither bathe, nor sleep, nor rinse his mouth, whilst naked; he must not wash his mouth, nor perform any sacred rite, with his waistband unfastened; and he must not offer oblations to fire, nor sacrifice to the gods, nor wash his mouth, nor salute a Brāhmaṇa, nor utter a prayer with only one garment on".⁵² In the *Sāmayācārika-dharma-sūtra* of Āpastamba, even a Brahmacāri, just returned from his noviciate, is required to dress himself with a *jāmā* (*kañcuka*) over his body-clothes, and to move about with either shoes or pattens on.⁵³