Ancient Indian Education: An Inquiry into its Origin, Development, and Ideals c5.122

c5.122

Although with these few small exceptions Indian women have been shut out from any education except the training in domestic and religious duties mentioned above, they have generally had before them a high ideal of virtue and devotion, and when opportunities have been given them have shown themselves capable of great intellectual attainments. The very custom of *satī*, or self-immolation of the widow on her husband’s funeral pyre, horrible and barbarous as it now seems even to Indian people themselves, was at least a sign of the great self-sacrifice and wifely devotion of which Indian women were capable.