Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture v1.c5.385

v1.c5.385

¹ Traces of the matriarchate cannot be proved from the Epic. ix, 4.9 gives the list of the dearest kindred : son, brother, sister’s son, and uncle on the mother’s side; ix, 9.46, likewise : son, brother, grandfather, maternal uncle, sister’s son, friend. Cp. vi, 46.2 f. In ix, 5.12 Kṛṣṇa’s great grief for the dead son of his sister is referred to. But he is also the son of his dearest friend. The relation between mother’s brother and sister’s son is looked on as naturally a very close one in viii, 7.9 f.; ix, 7.20, 39 too : Çalya has even left his bhāgineya, and is fighting for the Kurus. But the mātula is also often missing where a list of dearest kinsfolk is given. So, for instance, in x, 8.98, 121; xi, 12.19, 55; 27.2 f. And that the particularly near relation to the mother’s brother does not in itself give any proof of mother-right is stressed by Ed. Meyer, loc. cit., p. 29. According to Hopkins, *Journ. Americ. Orient. Soc.*, xiii, note, pp. 141 f., the importance of the mātula in the MBh. would even be a later phenomenon. See too *Journ. Roy. Asiatic Soc.*, xiii, 139, note, and Jacobi, *Gött. Gel. Anzeig.*, 1899, pp. 882 ff. WZKM, xxiii, 165; Schrader, *D. Indogermanen*, 75, 107. On the other hand the matriarchate is often found among the primitive population of India. Thus according to Dalton among the Pani-Koch the property belongs to the wife, her daughters inherit it, the husband lives with his mother-in-law and must obey her and his wife; if he commits adultery he pays 60 rupees, or is sold as a slave (*Zschr. f. Ethnol.*, vol. v, p. 336). Among the Khasi in the mountains of Assam the matriarchate is found remarkably developed. See Fuller, *Indian Life and Sentiment*, 171-174, and *Anthropos*, iv, 892 f.