History of Mediaeval Hindu India (being a History of India from 600 to 1200 A.D.) v1.c22.s1.4

v1.c22.s1.4

The Indo-Aryans go to the other extreme in this matter; at least they have done so in Nepal. Among the higher castes in Nepal the Aryans or mixed Aryans punish adultery most severely. The guilty wife is imprisoned for life, while the injured husband has the right to cut down the guilty man in public; the latter, however, is allowed to run away if he can. No widows are allowed to remarry; while those who elect to burn themselves on the funeral pyre of their deceased husbands are compelled to do so, if by chance they lose heart and wish to turn back from the burning pile. Such extremely high notions of a wife’s duty in one caste and such lax views of it in another placed side by side in the same country afford an interesting example of the power of ideas on human customs.