Fall of the Mughal Empire v1.c8.s3.13

v1.c8.s3.13

The Marātha soldiers were notorious for their practice of gang-rape in invaded territories from a very early time. In 1683 when they invaded the Goa districts under the eyes of their king Shambhuji, they committed this kind of outrage. A contemporary Portuguese account of that war states: "These enemies were so barbarous that when a woman appeared very beautiful (lit., best) to them, five or six of them violated her by lying with that woman alone. Up to now nowhere else in India has such barbarity been seen, nor even among the Kafris (Negroes). For this reason, many women of Margaon . . . threw themselves into pools, where they died of drowning. Others who bravely resisted the lewd intentions of some of the enemy soldiers, were killed with strokes of the broadsword, and of some others the breasts were cut off." (Tr. from Pissurlencar's *Portugueses e Maratas*, ii. 49. There is another Eng. tr. in I. O. L. *Portuguese Records*, *Noticias da India*, vol. i. part. 2.) *Mis. du Madure*, iii. 270.