[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.c7.60 # Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture v1.c7.60 Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture v1.c7.60 - **Language:** English ### [v1.c7.60](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v1.c7.60) Sexual union not from the fire of love, but only during the ṛitu is the old and holy rule for all the four castes, too, which prevailed in the golden age ; and great was the blessing. Thus, i, 64.4 ff. tells us : When Paraçurāma had destroyed all the Kshattriyas in the world, the Kshattriya women to get children approached the Brahmans. With them the pious Brahmans united at every ṛitu, but not from greed of love, nor at any other time. The Kshattriya women now bore offspring strong and long-lived beyond the ordinary, and all creatures ever kept to the pious rule of rightful copulation, even the beasts. So, then, they went to their wives during the ṛitu only, then they throve through their virtuous ways and lived a hundred thousand years. From all pain, of mind and body, mankind was freed ; none died in childhood ; none that had not reached the bloom of youth knew woman (na ca striyam prajānāti kaçcid aprāptayauvanaḥ, çl. 17). They practised all that was fair, good, and pious ; the kings ruled with justice ; and so it rained at the right time and in the right place, and everywhere prevailed nothing but happiness, and strength and peace—it was the golden age. Such glory as this was naturally in the first place due to the most excelling begetters of this race, the Brahmans, but then, too, to their way of begetting virtuous, strong, and beautiful offspring. At this time the woman is not only well fitted and with the right and duty to procreate, but also she is clean. Otherwise uncleanness dwells in her, and every kind of magical harm,² and in the peculiarly mysterious menstrual blood are concentrated all these dread powers, but in it, too, they are discharged. Therefore, the Epic declares, too : “ This according to the law is an incomparable means of cleansing the woman, O Dushyanta ; for month after month the menstrual blood takes all the evil in them away ” (duritāni in the magical and in the moral meaning, K., i, 100.5). Indeed, even if the man suspects his wife of unfaithfulness, he must confidently lie with her again after she has had her courses, since she is thereby cleansed again, like a vessel by ashes (xii, 35.30).¹ So, therefore, the woman can for this reason, too, demand her natural and religious rights during the ṛitu. - [Previous: v1.c7.59](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v1.c7.59) - [Next: v1.c7.61](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v1.c7.61) - [Up: v1.c7](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v1.c7) ## Linked texts (1) - [Mahābhārata](https://indike.org/pramana/in.lit.mahabharata.vyasa.1.64.4) — Vyāsa, Sanskrit --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v1.c7.60](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.polity.meyer-1915.v1.c7.60) · Pramāṇa