The Pandyan Kingdom from the Earliest Times to the Sixteenth Century c17.32

c17.32

Marco Polo says that all male children were dismissed from their homes when they attained thirteen and after that they had to get their living by trade. 'And these urchins are running about all day from pillar to post, buying and selling. . . . And every day they take their food to their mothers to be cooked and served, but do not eat a scrap at the expense of their fathers.' This could not have been universal; perhaps Marco found the system prevailing among some sections of the population. He refers to temples as 'certain abbeys in which are Gods and Goddesses to whom many young girls are consecrated'—a reference to *dēvadāsis*. The nature of the institution of the temple dancing-girls seems, however, to have been hardly understood by the traveller.