Life in Ancient India as Depicted in the Jain Canons, with Commentaries: An Administrative, Economic, Social and Geographical Survey c7.s6.t3.1

c7.s6.t3.1

Like robbery, adultery also was punished severely with death, imprisonment, mutilation and banishment. We are told that a person who committed adultery was censured and beaten, his head was shaved and his penis mutilated.³⁴ Ujjhiya was a merchant's son of Vāniyagāma who used to visit a courtesan named Kāmajjhayā. It so happened that the king also loved the same courtesan. One day, finding Ujjhiya in her house, the king turned him out and kept the courtesan as his mistress After some time Ujjhiya succeeded in visiting Kāmajjhayā secretly He was caught and was belaboured by the royal officers His hands were tightly bound behind his back, his nose and ears were mutilated, his body was besmeared with oil, he wore a pan of rough rags, round his neck was thrown a garland of red flowers, red dust was sprinkled over his body, he was made to eat the small pieces of his flesh, his offence being proclaimed at every square with the beat of a broken drum and thus he was led away to the place of execution.³⁵ A similar story is told about Sagada, who secretly visited the courtesan Sudamsanā, a keep of the king's minister. Sagada was charged with adultery and was brought before the king, who ordered him to be executed along with the courtesan Sagada was made to embrace a red-hot iron image of a woman till he died ³⁶ Then Bahassadatta, a minister of king Udayana, was impaled for a similar offence along with the queen.³⁷ Similarly, a merchant of Śrīnilayanagara is said to have been ordered to be executed for an offence of living in adultery with the queens of the harem. In this case it is said that not only the offender but even his friends and admirers were put to death³⁸