Hindu Law and Custom (Recht und Sitte) c7.766

c7.766

The privileges of motherhood are certainly as a rule valid only for mothers of sons; a wife who gives birth only to daughters as well as a barren wife may be replaced (M. 9, 81). Also the general opinion about the inferiority and the evil propensities of the female sex is to be taken into consideration, according to which the woman can never live excepting under guardianship; in her old age she should remain under the protection of her sons, when a girl she is protected by her father, and when a wife, by her husband (M. 9, 2-18; Y. 1, 85; Nār. 13, 31 etc). A gradual independence of the woman in the field of the partition of property is perceptible in the development of the Strīdhana (§ 25). Hār. 3, 3 gives a graphic description of the duties of a woman. She should concentrate all her thoughts on her household and her husband, carefully prepare the food, eat what remains after her husband and her sons have taken their meals, wash the cooking utensils, besmear the earth with cowdung (it is done even to this day), offer sacrifices to the gods, and before going to sleep respectfully embrace the feet of her husband; she should serve him, fan him in the hot season, support his head when he is tired, etc. In her home circle the matron rules absolute specially over her daughters and daughters-in-law, the principle of seniority, the yathāpūrvam, is expressly extended also over the female members of the family (Gaut. 6, 3 ff.; Āp. 1, 14, 9; Mah. 13, 105, 19 etc.)