BARBARIC CUSTOM

Evening Star, Issue 22631, 24 April 1937, Page 28

BARBARIC CUSTOM

SUTTEE IN INDIA EYE-WITNESS'S DESCRIPTION , A cable message recently, reporting the fanatical act of a Brahmin’s widow, near Agra, in seeking death by burning on the funeral pile beside her dead husband, revives interest in that barbaric Indian custom, suttee. ' The practice of this supreme act of wifely devotion, though never general, having been confined to the most devout Brahmins, the highest caste of Hindus, goes back to earliest times. The word suttee a corruption of the Sanskrit :‘sati”( a true wife), originated, as,/lid the custom, from the act of a wife of Brahma having had herself burnt beside her husband’s corpse, ao that she might accompany him • to heaven.

. The carrying out of this terrible rite, though discouraged' both by the Mohammedan rulers and the British Government, was never actually forbidden by law until 1829, when Lord "William Bentmok, then Governor-Gen-eral of Bengal, brought in an act making any person aiding or abetting a woman to. commit suttee liable to the death penalty. - Because the practice was not genera], ftnd owing to the repugnance felt by Europeans to witnessing such a terrible spectacle, few of them have seen a ; suttee, and still fewer have left an account of this appalling ceremony. Two detailed descriptions, however, have been preserved. One from the pen of Count de Maudaye, a French soldier of fortune, describes the burning of the wife of Mandaram, _ a Cashjniri Brahmin, which he. witnessed at Feizahad in 1774; the other published anonymously by an English officer in the ‘ Calcutta Gazette.’ February 10, 1785, records his impressions of one he saw near Ghandernagore. As the count’s narrative relates to the more ceremonious suttee, and’ the • one which is less known, it may prove of greater interest.

In a preliminary discourse on the custom, Count de Maudave exhibits his Anglophobia by writing; “It is certain that the Europeans oppose, ns far as they can, those barbarous tragedies in .the place of which they are rulers; I except the English in Bengal, who. in this _ regard, allow liberty enough to the widows, esneeiallv when they am old or ugly.” That is what might be described in the par-

lance of to-day, “ a nasty one,” but to return to the count’s narrative. He writes:— COUNT’S NARRATIVE. “ On December 31 they told me that a Cashmin writer, named Mandaram, the Brahmin, who was in the service of the Nabob, had just died, and that his wife had declared that she wished to conform to their religious rite. They told us at the same time that they had obtained the permit from the Nabob, and that the ceremony would take place at noon two miles from the town. We knew that Sudjah Dowlah had sent messengers to this woman to turn her from her resolution, and to induce her to live and take care of three children whom she had left. The youngest of these was still unweaned. He offered her money and promised to give her her husband’s appointments if she should consent.

“ This woman, having thanked the Nabob for his kindness, replied that it was no embarrassment regarding her means that had determined her to die, hut that she wished to rejoin her husband, and that her children, in charge of their uncle, would be brought up with care, and would Jack nothing in the way of their education. The Nabob’s envoys spoke to her privately. She replied in the same’ way she had to her relatives in the envoyls presence. Tin’s woman was about 34 years of age. “At 10 o’clock in the morning I went to the appointed place, and I saw that they had carted the wood to make the pyre. At the place were three or four Brahmins and five or six carpenters, who were making mortices in some large pieces of wood in which to put .uprights. They first swept the spot where the pyre was to stand. A Brahmin drew some mystic figures, and after murmuring some prayers, scattered a white powder, which j took to be cowduug ashes. tl They then made, at the head and foot of the pile, six large holes, two feet deep, four for the corners. There they fixed the- pieces of wood furnished with uprights, on which they piled a quantity of large dry logs to a height of eight or nine feet. On this mass, by the aid of crossbeams fixed on the uprights, they formed a small chamber ,to fio'd the corpse and the woman. This chamber was roofed with a multitude of rounded pieces of wood, like the top of an areade. This dome-like structure was covered with bundles of straw. Tn it they placed a couch, and decorated the four sides of the pile. All these labourers worked with such ferocious energy that I was amazed. “ Meanwhile, the woman mounted on a small horse, and follower] by a train of attendants, arrived. Her own husband's relatives surrounded, her, as well as some musicians. She reined

her horse up under a tree, where 1 looked at her intently. She was facing the pyre. She spoke to those about her, and asked where the pool was where she was to perform her ablutions, and on being shown, rode over to it. " THE SON’S PARTr “ They had placed her son in a place she could not see him, and they then made him approach the pile. They carried the body of the father, which was wrapped in a yellow shroud, thither on a stretcher. The son went through the usual ceremonies -with the straw and water, and he then put beside the corpse a plate of rice and other eatables. Then he returned whence he had come. They then placed the body in one side of the chamber. “ The woman returned from the pool, and, still on horseback, approached the pile. I found myself beside her. Taking off a Cashmere shawl from her head, she pulled from her pocket a leaf of beetlenut and some cardamom seeds, which she began to eat while conversing with her acquaintances _ She twice asked for water and drank it. She then said she wished to mount the pyre. Several people assisted her to dismount and helped her to get up into the chamber, where she sat down beside her husband’s body. The entrance of the chamber was then closed with bundles of wood, piled crossways, and immediately the child, to- whom they . had given a lighted torch, was led Tip. Ho walked round the pyre and lit one side, and simultaneously other relatives performed the same ceremony, so that in the twinkling of an eye the whole pile was ablaze.

“ I forgot to say that when the woman had signified her wish to mount the pile some of the Nabob’s officials approached to speak to her, but the Cashmins pushed them away with much hooting, As soon as the pyre was afire all the Brahmins began turning round and round, shouting out and playing music. “ T could not discern any movement of the woman in the midst of the pile, as the flames and smoke obscured my view, hut in seven or eight minutes from the time the fire had been lighted one of my men whom I had sent closer to it than I could get, considered her dead. I firmly believe she had been suffocated in little more than a minute. ' This horrible spectacle impressed me so forcibly that. for two days I could think of nothing else. So deeply is the image of this woman engraved on my memory that it will never_ he effaced. She showed signs of neither trouble nor agitation, and performed all these terrifying coremonies in the most unconcerned manner imaginable.”