Muslim Slave System in Medieval India c16.13

c16.13

It has been repeatedly said Musalmans are allowed by the Quran and the Hadis to have four wives. The aphorisms and maxims current about this phenomenon indicate that all wives could not have been procured in the normal way; some would have been purchased, some others captured. One aphorism says, One quarrels with you, two are sure to involve you in their quarrels; when you have three, factions are formed against her you love best; but four find society and occupation among themselves, leaving the husband in peace.¹⁶ According to another, Wives there be four: theres Bedfellow, Muckheap [dirty], Gadabout [idle] and Queen O women. The more the pity that the last is one in a hundred.¹⁷ Yet another says, A man should marry four wives: A Persian to have some one to talk to; a Khurasani woman for his housework; a Hindu for nursing his children; a woman from Mawaraun nahr, or Transoxiana, to have some one to whip as a warning to the other three.¹⁸ The mention of so many nationalities in the sayings show that obtaining wives and concubines through all kinds of means - capture, purchase, enslavement - was in vogue among medieval Muslims.