§ 6. Seclusion of Girls at Puberty in India and Cambodia

[Seclusion of girls at puberty among the Hindoos; seclusion of girls at puberty in Southern India.]

When a Hindoo maiden reaches maturity she is kept in a dark room for four days, and is forbidden to see the sun. She is regarded as unclean; no one may touch her. Her diet is restricted to boiled rice, milk, sugar, curd, and tamarind without salt. On the morning of the fifth day she goes to a neighbouring tank, accompanied by five women whose husbands are alive. Smeared with turmeric water, they all bathe and return home, throwing away the mat and other things that were in the room. 157 The Rarhi Brahmans of Bengal compel a girl at puberty to live alone, and do not allow her to see the face of any male. For three days she remains shut up in a dark room, and has to undergo certain penances. Fish, flesh, and sweetmeats are forbidden her; she must live upon rice and ghee. 158 Among the Tiyans of Malabar a girl is thought to be polluted for four days from the beginning of her first menstruation. During this time she must keep to the north side of the house, where she sleeps on a grass mat of a particular kind, in a room festooned with garlands of young coco-nut leaves. Another girl keeps her company and sleeps with her, but she may not touch any other person, tree or plant. Further, she may not see the sky, and woe betide her if she catches sight of a crow or a cat! Her diet must be strictly vegetarian, without salt, tamarinds, or chillies. She is armed against evil spirits by a knife, which is placed on the mat or carried on her person. 159 Among the Kappiliyans of Madura and Tinnevelly a girl at her first monthly period remains under pollution for thirteen days, either in a corner of the house, which is screened off for her use by her maternal uncle, or in a temporary hut, which is erected by the same relative on the common land of the village. On the thirteenth day she bathes in a tank, and, on entering the house, steps over a pestle and a cake. Near the entrance some food is placed and a dog is allowed to partake of it; but his enjoyment is marred by suffering, for while he eats he receives a sound thrashing, and the louder he howls the better, for the larger will be the family to which the young woman will give birth; should there be no howls, there will be no children. The temporary hut in which the girl passed the days of her seclusion is burnt down, and the pots which she used are smashed to shivers. 160 Similarly among the Parivarams of Madura, when a girl attains to puberty she is kept for sixteen days in a hut, which is guarded at night by her relations; and when her sequestration is over the hut is burnt down and the pots she used are broken into very small pieces, because they think that if rain-water gathered in any of them, the girl would be childless. 161 The Pulayars of Travancore build a special hut in the jungle for the use of a girl at puberty; there she remains for seven days. No one else may enter the hut, not even her mother. Women stand a little way off and lay down food for her. At the end of the time she is brought home, clad in a new or clean cloth, and friends are treated to betel-nut, toddy, and arack. 162 Among the Singhalese a girl at her first menstruation is confined to a room, where she may neither see nor be seen by any male. After being thus secluded for two weeks she is taken out, with her face covered, and is bathed by women at the back of the house. Near the bathing-place are kept branches of any milk-bearing tree, usually of the jak-tree. In some cases, while the time of purification or uncleanness lasts, the maiden stays in a separate hut, which is afterwards burnt down. 163

[Seclusion of girls at puberty in Cambodia.]

In Cambodia a girl at puberty is put to bed under a mosquito curtain, where she should stay a hundred days. Usually, however, four, five, ten, or twenty days are thought enough; and even this, in a hot climate and under the close meshes of the curtain, is sufficiently trying. 164 According to another account, a Cambodian maiden at puberty is said to "enter into the shade." During her retirement, which, according to the rank and position of her family, may last any time from a few days to several years, she has to observe a number of rules, such as not to be seen by a strange man, not to eat flesh or fish, and so on. She goes nowhere, not even to the pagoda. But this state of seclusion is discontinued during eclipses; at such times she goes forth and pays her devotions to the monster who is supposed to cause eclipses by catching the heavenly bodies between his teeth. 165 This permission to break her rule of retirement and appear abroad during an eclipse seems to shew how literally the injunction is interpreted which forbids maidens entering on womanhood to look upon the sun.