History of Mediaeval Hindu India (being a History of India from 600 to 1200 A.D.) v3.c41.s4.6

v3.c41.s4.6

The marriage customs of the Hindus underwent a momentous change during this sub-period. In previous centuries Brahmins and Kshatriyas could marry and did marry women from castes lower than themselves. Even Khurdadba writing about 900 A. D. states that Brahmins could take wives from Kataria or Kshatriyas (though they did not give them their daughters) and we have the well-known instance of Rājaśekhara marrying a Chāhamāna lady about 900 A. D. Al-Beruni, however, writes that " formerly a Hindu could marry a woman of his caste or lower caste, but in our time a Brahmin never marries a woman except from his own caste". Naturally in all castes and even sub-castes marriage outside the caste ceased entirely. Why this restriction arose does not appear clear. Probably the lower position assigned by the new provisions of Smritis to children of lower caste wives, a fact corroborated even by Al-Beruni who states that the progeny of such former marriages was treated as of the caste of the mother, must have been found inconvenient. In the same house thus of a Brahmin father, there would be children who would be Brahmins, Kshatriyas and Vaiśyas. The Manu Smṛiti rule was, as shown in Vol. II, that all such children were Brahmins and in some cases, of an intermediate caste higher than that of the mother. The difference of food and drink between a Brahmin, a Kshatriya or a Vaiśya, the Brahmins and Vaiśyas in the middle land and southern India abstaining from flesh also, must have again caused great trouble in such a mixed family. The result naturally was that marriage was restricted to the same caste and even sub-section of a caste or sub-caste.