[Pramāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/) › [Studies](https://indike.org/pramana/ins) › [Polity, law and society](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity) › [Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915) › v1.c5.369 # Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture v1.c5.369 Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture v1.c5.369 - **Language:** English ### [v1.c5.369](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v1.c5.369) ² The teaching here set forth is anyhow more acceptable than the actual custom of the Hassanieh Arabs, of whom J. Petherick (\*Egypt, the Soudan and Central Africa\*, p. 151) reports that the wives in this tribe are only bound to be faithful to their husbands for three or four days out of the seven in the week and that the latter feel themselves highly flattered if their fairer halves have a great many love adventures during the marriage holiday; for they would look on this as a proof that their wives were attractive (Finck, \*Primitive Love Stories\*, p. 92; Henne am Rhyn, \*Die Frau in der Kulturgesch\*., Berlin, 1892, p. 20; Hartland, ii, 222). The Bahuana in the Congo area demand faithfulness of their wives only during pregnancy: they believe that at this time other sexual intercourse harms the child. Not only is the husband, among not a few peoples, left cold if his wife bestows her favours on others, but often it is even the greatest honour for the wife if she is embraced by a great many; her owner then basks, like the Hassanieh just mentioned, in the consciousness of calling such a treasure his own. So the Brame in Africa is proud when his wife has many lovers; the Kamchadale women plume themselves on the number of their lovers; among the Gindans the fair, like the "lady in the chest", who is especially known from the Arabian story-book, used to wear, as a token of each man conquered and embraced by them, a leathern anklet; among the Bullam, Bago, and Timmaney in West Africa the married woman who should repel a man she had kindled would be held as extremely uncivil and badly brought up; and among the inhabitants of the island of Augila, and the Nasamones, the more men lay with a newly-wedded wife on the wedding night, the greater the - [Previous: v1.c5.368](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v1.c5.368) - [Next: v1.c5.370](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v1.c5.370) - [Up: v1.c5](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v1.c5) --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v1.c5.369](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v1.c5.369) · Pramāṇa