Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v2.c20.s3.68

v2.c20.s3.68

We may not end our remarks on this aspect of Vijayanagara life without noting the comments of foreign travellers on the immense wealth of the public women of Vijayanagara. Paes writes thus: "Who can fitly describe to you the great riches these women carry on their persons?—collars of gold with so many diamonds and rubies and pearls, bracelets also on their arms and on their upper arms, girdles below, and of necessity anklets on the feet. The marvel should be otherwise, namely that women of such a profession should obtain such wealth; but there are women among them who have lands that have been given to them, and litters, and so many maid-servants that one cannot number all their things. There is a woman in this city who is said to have a hundred thousand *pardaos*, and I believe this from what I have seen of them".¹ Duarte Barbosa also speaks about the extraordinary wealth of these women. "Some of them are so rich that a short time ago one of them, dying without son or daughter, made the King heir to all her property, who, when he sent to collect what she had left, found that a sum of seventy thousand *pardaos* remained as well as another twelve thousand, which during her life she had set apart and left to one of her handmaids whom she had brought up from childhood; wherein there is no great marvel, for this kind of merchandise is the greatest and richest found in this world !"¹