The Position of Women in Hindu Civilisation, from Prehistoric Times to the Present Day c6.44

c6.44

The modern reader, on being told that female education was fairly widespread, will naturally enquire whether there was a system of co-education, or whether lady students were taught separately. The historian has to confess that in the present state of our knowledge this question is difficult to answer. In the Vedic age education was mostly centred in the family; brothers, sisters and cousins probably studied together under the family elders. Subsequently, when specialisation became the order of the day, students had to leave their homes and often go to distant places to study under celebrated teachers. When there were competent lady teachers (*āchāryās*) available, parents must have naturally preferred to send their daughters to read under them. But the number of these could not have been very large. In technical subjects like theology, philosophy and medicine most of the experts were usually males, and advanced lady students used to go to them for their studies. This is clear from the example of Ātreyī in the *Uttararāmacharita*, who was reading under Vālmīki along with Lava and Kuśa, the sons of Rāma. It would seem that co-education in higher studies was not unknown even in the 8th century A. D., for Bhavabhūti in his *Mālatīmādhava* represents Kāmandakī as being educated along with Bhūrivasu and Devarāta¹. Usually, however, ordinary girls who did not go in for higher education were educated in their own families by their fathers, uncles or brothers or by local lady teachers. It has to be remembered that, down to the 4th century A. D., there were no public schools even for boys. Writers like Hārīta lay down that girls should be usually taught at home by their male relations¹. They probably refer to the practice of about the 5th century B. C. We should not forget that higher female education was generally confined to cultured and well-to-do families.