Administration and Social Life under Vijayanagar c13.s2: Section V. Habitation, Food and Dress

Administration and Social Life under Vijayanagar c13.s2

Language: English

c13.s2.t1 Food — 25 parts
c13.s2.t2 Dress — 37 parts

Section V. Habitation, Food and Dress

The foreign travellers who visited Vijayanagar and a few other important provincial centres have left brilliant accounts of the immense size of the cities and the excellent palaces and houses in them. But India was a land of villages as it still continues to be, and the condition of life in the villages was not so attractive as to draw the pen of the travellers. And it is difficult to estimate the exact number of villages in the empire. Abdur Razāk while describing the west coast region says that he arrived "each day at a town or village well populated".¹⁶⁸ Nikitin, the Russian traveller, remarks that between the large towns there were many small ones, and that he came across three such places each day and occasionally four.¹⁶⁹ Paes also speaks of many cities and walled villages.¹⁷⁰ But we have no definite idea as to the number of villages in the empire.¹⁷¹

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¹⁶⁸ Elliot, Hist. of Ind., IV, p. 104.

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¹⁶⁹ Major, India, p. 12.

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¹⁷⁰ Sewell, op. cit., p. 237.

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¹⁷¹ An epigraph of the time of Sadāśiva states that the Kuntala deśa over which he ruled was twenty-seven thousand yojanas in extent. S. V. Venkatesvara infers from this that there were twenty-seven thousand villages in the empire (Indian Culture Through the Ages, II, p. 172). The assumption, however, appears to have no warrant.

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For a descriptive account of the city of Vijayanagar and its lofty palaces the writings of the foreign travellers are of indispensable value. The Persian ambassador says that the city of Vijayanagar was so built that it had seven fortified walls one within the other. It was in the seventh fortress that the palace of the king was situated.¹⁷² Paes testifies to the fact that the palace of the king was surrounded by a very strong wall like some of the others and enclosed a very large space.¹⁷³ Outside the entrance of the door to the king's residence were two images painted like life. According to Paes they represented Kṛṣṇadēva Rāya and his father. Inside on the left there were two chambers one above the other. The lower one was below the level of the ground with two little steps which were covered with gilded copper, and the way from there to the top was all lined with gold, and outside, it was dome-shaped. It had a four-sided porch made of cane work and embroidered with precious stones. In that chamber was a bed. In the palace there was a room with pillars of carved stone and ivory. Behind these was the dancing hall.¹⁷⁴

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¹⁷² Elliot, Hist. of Ind., IV, pp. 106-7.

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¹⁷³ Sewell, op. cit., p. 254.

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¹⁷⁴ See ibid., pp. 286-88.

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An interesting feature about the palaces was the pictures painted on their walls. Paes says that there were many chambers in the king's palace at Vijayanagar and in front of one of them were "figures of women, with bows and arrows like amazons."¹⁷⁵

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¹⁷⁵ Ibid., p. 287.

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The nobility of Vijayanagar also lived in fully equipped and well provided houses. Barbosa mentions that there were palaces in the city after the fashion of those of the king (with many enclosed courts and great houses very well built), wherein dwelt the great lords and governors.¹⁷⁶ Like the palaces of the king, these houses of the nobles generally had compounds. According to the account of Paes, from the second line of walls at the capital to the king's palace, there were many streets and rows of houses with many "figures and decorations pleasing to look at."¹⁷⁷ The rich merchants in the city also lived in such houses; the same chronicler says that there was a broad and beautiful street of fine houses which were owned by rich men who could afford to live in them.¹⁷⁸ The dancing girls who lived in the city also occupied equally good houses. Abdur Razāk mentions that behind the mint was a sort of bazaar which was more than three hundred yards long and twenty yards broad, on both sides of which there were houses (khanaha) and fore-courts (safhaha). In front of them instead of benches (kursi) were built lofty seats of excellent stone.¹⁷⁹ On each side of the avenue formed by these houses of the nobles and dancing girls were figures of lions, panthers, tigers and other animals, so well painted that they seemed to be alive.¹⁸⁰ The Pārijātāpaharaṇamu also mentions the paintings of birds, swans, doves, parrots and other domesticated animals in these houses.¹⁸¹

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¹⁷⁶ Barbosa, I, p. 202.

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¹⁷⁷ Sewell, op. cit., p. 254.

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¹⁷⁸ Ibid., p. 255.

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¹⁷⁹ Elliot, Hist. of Ind., IV, p. 111.

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¹⁸⁰ Ibid., p. 111.

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¹⁸¹ Canto I, v. 106.

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Though persons who could afford all this lived in such lofty houses, the middle class people do not appear to have enjoyed any such amenities. Paes says that there were more than a hundred thousand dwelling houses in Vijayanagar all one-storeyed and flat roofed to each of which there was a low surrounding wall.¹⁸² He was evidently impressed with these houses and says that the general plan of the houses was good and they were like terraces.¹⁸³ But the poorer people lived in small thatched and straw houses with only small doors.¹⁸⁴ The houses of the middle class people were arranged "according to occupations in long streets with many open spaces."¹⁸⁵ This arrangement of the houses of the people according to their occupation is also evidenced by the inscriptions which mention such streets as Kammāḷatteru¹⁸⁶ (the artisans' street), and the Kaikkōḷatteru¹⁸⁷ (the weavers' street). The flooring of many of these houses was of mud. It was kept neat and clean by smearing cowdung and water.¹⁸⁸

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¹⁸² Sewell, op. cit., p. 290; see for a description of the houses in Nāgalāpura, p. 246; see also p. 244.

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¹⁸³ Ibid., p. 286.

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¹⁸⁴ Purchas, His Pilgrims, X, p. 262; Barbosa, I, p. 202; Sewell, op. cit., p. 129.

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¹⁸⁵ Barbosa, I, p. 202. Dames has the following note on this: "The words 'according to occupation' are not expressed separately but are implied in the verb arruar according to Bluteau (1789) and Vieyra (1813). The allusion is to the allocation of trades and crafts each to its own quarter or Muhalla still prevalent in Indian towns." (ibid., fn. 1). See Sewell, op. cit., p. 256 for a reference to the Moorish quarter.

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¹⁸⁶ 396 of 1911.

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¹⁸⁷ 319 of 1911.

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¹⁸⁸ For a contemporary notice of this practice by Pietro della Valle, see his Travels, II, pp. 230-31; see also Rockhill, Notes on the Relations and Trade of China, etc., Toung Pao, XVI, p. 456.

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Large towns appear to have had certain special amenities which the smaller towns and villages could not have enjoyed. The first among such was a pleasure garden or park. In the city of Vijayanagar for instance there were many groves of trees. The king had close to his palace a palm grove and other rich fruit bearing trees. There were also near the Moorish quarter many orchards and gardens with fruit bearing trees, for the most part mangoes and areca palms and jack trees, orange and lime trees growing so closely one to another that they appeared like a thick forest.¹⁸⁹ In many of these parts there were conduits of water which flowed into the midst of them and in certain places there were also lakes.¹⁹⁰

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¹⁸⁹ Sewell, op. cit., pp. 256-57.

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¹⁹⁰ Ibid.

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Another amenity which large cities like Vijayanagar seem to have enjoyed was the town bell which was very helpful to the people for knowing the exact time of day.¹⁹¹

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¹⁹¹ Pārijātā, canto II, v. 3.

Food

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The articles of food grown in the Vijayanagar empire were rice, Indian corn, grains, beans and other kinds of crops. Of the grains there was a great quantity because, besides being used as food for men, they were also used for horses; besides these, excellent wheat was also grown, though on a small scale.¹⁹² These articles along with beans, moong (green gram), pulses, horse-gram, and many other seeds were all stocked in the market and sold very cheap. Paes says that wheat was not so common as the other grains since no one ate it except the Moors. Poultry and fowls were also used for food by a few classes of people. Three fowls could be had for a vintem within the city while outside it four could be had.¹⁹³

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¹⁹² Sewell, op. cit., p. 237.

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¹⁹³ Ibid., p. 257.

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When Abdur Razāk visited the Vijayanagar court he was daily supplied with two sheep, four couples of fowls, five mans of rice and one man of butter besides one of sugar.¹⁹⁴ Nuniz gives a curious list of food stuffs which constituted the dietary of the Vijayanagar sovereigns. He says: "These kings of Bisnaga eat all sorts of things, but not the flesh of oxen or cows which they never kill in all the country of the heathen because they worship them. They eat mutton, pork, venison, partridges, hares, doves, quail, and all kinds of birds; even sparrows and rats, and cats and lizards, all of which are sold in the market of the city of Bisnaga."¹⁹⁵ With this can be compared the accounts of Paes and Barbosa. Paes, while describing the animal food used at Vijayanagar says that the sheep killed in the city were countless for in every street there were men who sold mutton "so clean and so fat" that it looked like pork; and there were also pigs in the houses of some butchers in certain streets so white and clean that one "could never see better in any country."¹⁹⁶ Barbosa’s description of the food stuffs also tempers the grossly exaggerated picture of Nuniz for he says that the men ate flesh and fish and other meats saving beef only which was “forbidden by their perverse idolatry.”¹⁹⁷

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¹⁹⁴ Elliot, Hist. of Ind., IV, p. 113.

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¹⁹⁵ Sewell, op. cit., p. 375.

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¹⁹⁶ Ibid., p. 258.

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¹⁹⁷ Barbosa, I, p. 217.

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Though meat seems to have been used by a few people, it appears that all did not use it. The Brahmans and the Lingāyats took only vegetarian food. Nuniz asserts that the former never killed or ate any living thing.¹⁹⁸ Barbosa too notes that their food consisted of honey, butter, rice, sugar, which stewed like pulse and milk. Similarly the Jangamas also ate neither flesh nor fish.¹⁹⁹ We get also some idea about the meal in a Brahman’s house from the Āmuktamālyada. In the spring it consisted of four or five good curries, ghee, butter, vaḍāms, varavals, good rice food, rasam, and in the preparation of all these cocoanuts were used. In the summer season it consisted of kūḷu, ikṣurasam, cocoanut water, fruits, good smelling water, mangoes and others quite welcome for the season.²⁰⁰

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¹⁹⁸ Sewell, op. cit., p. 390.

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¹⁹⁹ Barbosa, I, pp. 217-18.

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²⁰⁰ Canto I. vv. 80 and 81.

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We learn about the royal kitchen from the chronicle of Nuniz. He says that the king had no expense in connection with his food (because his nobles sent it to him every day) which consisted of rice, wheat, meat and fowls with all the necessary things. In the royal kitchen there were some two hundred inferior guards with four persons over them and two officers of the guard, who were also captains of soldiers. But these ‘porters’ were not allowed to go further inside than through four or five doors, for there were only eunuchs and women inside.²⁰¹ The chronicler however contradicts himself when he says in another place that king Acyuta Rāya had ten women cooks for his personal service who prepared food for no one except the king himself.202 But at times when the king gave banquets he employed a few others. He had a eunuch for guarding the gate of the kitchen, and it was his duty to see that no one entered the place for fear of poison. The king generally ate alone, and was served by women whose duty it was to prepare the table for him; they would place for him a three-legged stool, round and made of gold, and on it were put the messes which were brought in large vessels of gold while the smaller ones were brought in basins of gold some of which were adorned with precious stones. There was no cloth on the table, but one was brought only when the king had finished eating; then he washed his hands and mouth.²⁰³

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²⁰¹ Sewell, op. cit., p. 371.

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²⁰³ Ibid., pp. 382-83.

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Abdur Razāk says that it was the custom of the "infidels" not to eat in the presence of one another.²⁰⁴ But Nuniz, while describing a banquet prepared by the brother of Dēva Rāya II, says that the nobles invited were at their table. However he notes that it was the custom among them to place upon the table all that there was for eating and drinking, and there was to be no one present in the hall except those that had come to eat.²⁰⁵

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²⁰⁴ Elliot, Hist. of Ind., IV, p. 115.

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²⁰⁵ Sewell, op. cit., p. 303; here the accounts of the Persian ambassador and Nuniz are contradictory. In the light of the latter's statement it is reasonable to hold that the former's statement is unreliable, and that only a few people, perhaps men of the low castes, were excluded from such banquets. Then again Nuniz's allusion to the custom of the servers of food remaining outside after laying the covers is not to be taken as the usual rule, for the peculiar circumstances and the reason for which that banquet was given would have necessitated the servants being kept outside the banqueting hall.

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The ordinary people appear to have used only leaves to eat their food from. Thus an inscription of A.D. 1524 mentions that one Śūrapparāja freed the Tammaḷa servants of a temple from supplying leaves (used in eating food) to that temple free of cost in return for some work.²⁰⁶ The leaves of areca palm also appear to have been used in taking food.²⁰⁷ There appear to have been public eating houses in a few important places. Vijayanagar for instance had such an eating house, where stone slabs with hollows in them for rice and curries were used for eating. The travellers might have been required to pay according to the kind of slab they selected.²⁰⁸ Besides such places there were many choultries where travellers were fed free for a particular number of days. A record of A.D. 1489-90 found at Koḍuvāy in the Chingleput district registers for instance the provision of kambu for meals for Brahman travellers.²⁰⁹

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²⁰⁶ 91 of 1912.

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²⁰⁷ Āmukta., canto IV, v. 35.

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²⁰⁸ See Gribble, A History of the Deccan, I, pp. 70-71.

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²⁰⁹ 109 of 1920; see also 152 of 1901.

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There appear to have been sweetmeat shops also (miṭāyi aṅgaḍi) in certain places in the empire.²¹⁰

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²¹⁰ Karṇāṭaka Kavicarite, II, p. 336.

Dress

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The sovereigns spent large sums of money on their dress. Dēva Rāya II appeared in court clothed in a robe of zaitun (satin).²¹¹ According to Paes, Kṛṣṇadēva Rāya was dressed in certain white clothes embroidered with many roses in gold.²¹² Nuniz also says that the kings wore silk clothes (pachoïs)²¹³ of very fine material and worked with gold which were worth each ten pardaos; they wore at times bajuris of the same sort which were like shirts with a skirt.²¹⁴ When they went to war they wore a quilted dress of cotton over which was put another garment with golden plasters with jewels all round it.²¹⁵

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²¹¹ Elliot, Hist. of Ind., IV, p. 113 and fn.

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²¹² Sewell, op. cit., p. 251.

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²¹³ Silken trappings (Ibid., p. 377).

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²¹⁴ Ibid., p. 283.

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²¹⁵ Varthema, Jones, p. 129.

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The kings wore “a cap of gold brocade two spans long”²¹⁶ which according to Paes was in the fashion of a Galician helmet covered with a piece of fine stuff all of silk.²¹⁷ Nuniz who also saw the cap worn by Acyuta says, that it was worth twenty cruzados and adds that when he lifted it from his head, he never again put it on.²¹⁸

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²¹⁶ Ibid.

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²¹⁷ Sewell, op. cit., pp. 251-2.

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²¹⁸ Ibid., p. 383; Barradas gives an account of the origin of these caps. See Saletore, Pol. and Soc. Life in the Vij. Emp., II, p. 299.

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The common people wore clothes as a girdle below “wound very tightly in many folds and short white shirt of cotton or silk or coarse brocade” which were gathered between the thighs but were open in front. On their heads they carried small turbans while some wore silk or brocade caps.²¹⁹ Caesar Frederick also describes the dress of the people as follows: “The apparell that they use in Bezeneger is Velvet, Satten, Damaske, Scarlet, or white Bumbast cloth, according to the estate of the person, with long Hats on their heads called Colae, made of Velvet, Satten, Damaske, or Scarlet, girding themselves instead of Girdles with some fine Bumbast cloth; they have breeches after the order of the Turkes.”²²⁰

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²¹⁹ Barbosa, I, p. 205.

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²²⁰ Purchas, His Pilgrims, X, p. 99.

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Wool was very little used. Nicolo dei Conti says that the people used to wear a linen cloth round the body; he adds they could not wear more clothing on account of the great heat.²²¹

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²²¹ Major, India, p. 22.

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The people were also accustomed to the use of shoes. Nicolo dei Conti observed that the people wore sandals with purple and golden ties.²²² Barbosa also noted the practice of the people using rough shoes on their feet (without stockings).²²³ Paes describes the shoes thus: “The shoes have pointed ends, in the ancient manner, and there are other shoes that have nothing but soles, but on the top are some straps which help to keep them on the feet. They are made like those which of old the Romans were wont to wear, as you will find on figures in some papers or antiquities which come from Italy.”²²⁴ Caesar Frederick also mentions that the people wore on their feet plain high things called Aspergh.²²⁵ But here too it was only the rich people that wore the shoes for as Paes himself says: “The majority of the people, or almost all, go about the country barefooted.”²²⁶ Nikitin also says that the people of the Deccan went about barefooted.²²⁷

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²²² Ibid.

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²²³ Barbosa, I, p. 205.

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²²⁴ Sewell, op. cit., p. 252.

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²²⁵ Purchas, His Pilgrims, X, p. 99.

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²²⁶ Sewell, op. cit., p. 252.

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²²⁷ Major, India, p. 12.

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Umbrellas also were in use. Barbosa describes vividly how they were held. He says: “They (the lords and the kings) also take another who holds an umbrella (lit. a shade hat with a handle) to shade them and keep off the rain, and of these some are made of finely worked silk with many golden tassels and precious stones and seed pearls. They are also so made as to open and shut and may cost three or four hundred cruzados.”²²⁸ Apparently all this does not refer to the ordinary people, for they lived in “grovelling poverty.” Varthema says that the common people went quite naked with the exception of a piece of cloth about their middle.²²⁹

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²²⁸ Barbosa, I, pp. 206-07; Dames has a note on the umbrellas. He says: “From their elaborate ornamentation and high price they must have been a luxury used only by the most wealthy.” (See ibid., pp. 206-07 fn.).

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²²⁹ Varthema, Jones, p. 129.

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The women, viz., the courtezans and the wives of nobles, also wore very rich dress. Barbosa observes that they wore white garments of very thin cotton or silk of bright colours, five yards long, one part of which was girt round below and the other part thrown over one shoulder and across their breasts in such a way that one arm and shoulder remained uncovered.²³⁰ Pietro della Valle also gives an account of the dress of the women. According to him they were clothed with figured silk from the girdle downwards. As for the upper garment he says: "(They are) from thence upward either naked, or else with very pure linen, either of one colour, or striped and wrought with several, besides a scarf of the same work cast over the shoulder."231 The women appear to have worn two clothes over their body, one a small one, covering the front of the person and the other a bigger one covering the whole body. Nicolo dei Conti says: "Almost all, both men and women, wear a linen cloth bound round the body, so as to cover the front of the person, and descending as low as the knees and over this a garment of linen or silk, which......with the women (descends) to the ankles".²³² The *Āmuktamālyada* also refers almost to this kind of double dress worn by the women when it mentions the *pāvāḍa* and the *paiṭa* (mantle).²³³

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²³⁰ Barbosa, I, p. 207.

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²³² Major, India, p. 22.

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²³³ Canto VI, v. 18.

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Sometimes women appear to have worn a head dress. Paes notes that the women who took part in the *Mahānavami* festival wore high caps (*collaes*) embroidered with flowers made of pearls.²³⁴ But neither Barbosa nor Pietro della Valle mentions this head dress worn by the women. But the former says that their heads were uncovered and the hair was "tightly gathered into a becoming knot on the top of the head."235 The latter also states that their "heads were deck'd with yellow and white flowers formed into a high large diadem, with some striking out like sun beams and others twisted together, and hanging down in several fashions which made a pretty sight.”²³⁶ Thus the head dress seems to have been worn by a few women only on certain ceremonial occasions.

Cites (2)

Āmuktamālyada — Kṛṣṇadevarāya 1515, Telugu
Pārijātāpaharaṇamu — Nandi Timmana, Telugu

Administration and Social Life under Vijayanagar c13.s2: Section V. Habitation, Food and Dress

Contents

Section V. Habitation, Food and Dress

Food

Dress

Cites (2)