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Many wives or many husbands -take your pick in medieval India!

Niccolo de Conti, travelled to India, China and other parts of South-East Asia in the early 15th century. He gave an oral account of his travels which was transcribed in Latin by a Papal scribe, Poggio in 1444. This was translated into Portuguese, then Italian, then into English first by John Frampton in 1579 (2). A more accessible (more easy for the modern reader) second English version was by R. H. John Major. The title of this book may be nearly as long as the book and runs as follows: “India in the Fifteenth Century – Being a collection of Narratives of Voyages to India – in the Century preceding the Portuguese discovery of the Cape of Good Hope – from Latin, Persian, Italian and Russian Sources – now first translated into English”!!! (3) This book also includes descriptions of India from other travellers and is a fascinating read.

Two contrasting descriptions of women can be found in the book. In the Vijayanagara kingdom, the king is said to have had 12000 wives! And in Kerala, each woman was described as having 8-10 husbands.

“Departing hence,and travelling about three hundred miles in land, he arrived at the great city of Bizcnegolia, situated near very steep mountains. The circumference of the city is sixty miles: its walls are carried upto the moun-tains and enclose the valleys at their foot, so that its extent is thereby encreascd. In this city there are estimated to be ninety thousand men fit to bear arms. The inhabitants of this region marry as many wives as they please, who are burnt with their dead husbands. Their king is more powerful than all the other kings of India. He takes to himself twelve thousand wives, of whom four thousand follow him on foot wherever he may go, and are employed solely in the service of the kitchen. A like number, more handsomely equipped, ride on horseback. The remainder are carried by men in litters, of whom two thousand or three thousand are selected as his wives on condition that at his death they should voluntarily burn themselves with him, which is considered to be a great honour for them.”

“…proceeded to Calicut, a maritime city, eight miles in circum-ference, a noble emporium for all India, abounding in pep-per, lac, ginger, a larger kind of cinnamon, myrobalans, and zedoary* In this district alone the women are allowed to take several husbands, so that some have ten and more. The husbands contribute amongst themselves to the maintenance of the wife, who lives apart from her husbands. When one visits her he leaves a mark at the door of the house, which being seen by another coming afterwards, he goes away with-out entering. The children are allotted to the husbands at the will of the wife. The inheritance of the father does not descend to the children, but to the grandchildren.”

What a contrast!

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niccol%C3%B2_de%27_Conti
2. Editorial Introduction to Nicolò de’ Conti’s Account by Kennon Breazeale; SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research, Vol. 2, No. 2, Autumn 2004, ISSN 1479-8484
3. https://archive.org/stream/indiainfifteenth00majorich#page/n7/mode/2up