Here comes the government, with an updated grihyasutra!

Sans the Sacred

The Union Cabinet has cleared a proposal to increase the minimum age of women for marriage from 18 to 21, bringing them on par with men. It got me thinking about age and marriage in ancient Sanskrit texts. Many texts classify women by age. For instance, Nagarasarvasva, a manual on love, says that a girl up to the age of 16 is a child (bala), a woman up to 30 years is young (taruni), between 30 and 50 is ‘mature’ (praudha), and after 50 is old (vriddha). It seems like 50 was the old 70.

While the Kamasutra states that a bride’s age must be at least three years less than the groom’s, some scriptures maintain that the optimum ages of the bride and groom should be in the ratio 1:3. Yes, you read that right! It rather explains some verses in Sanskrit and Prakrit about unfortunate women who were unwillingly married off to much older men. Rudrata’s Kavyalankara, likely from the ninth century, has a verse that reads: “Somehow, with great difficulty and tightly closed eyes, young women kiss the lips of old men as if they were bitter medicine.”

PV Kane’s work on the history of ancient Indian law is a veritable treasure of information, and in addition to telling us about various rites and prescriptions connected with marriage, he also mentions a strange practice prescribed in the grihyasutras for selecting a bride. Now, there are many Sanskrit texts telling men what kind of girls to marry. PSA: If you are a woman and you have the name of a tree or river, you’re either hairless or very hairy, or you have dimples, or you don’t have brothers, I must inform you sadly that men would be advised against marrying you in ancient India.

Of course, we are not certain any of these rules were ever followed to the letter, given that barely anyone would be eligible to be married at all!

But in addition to these, how was anyone to know if the woman would bring good fortune or not? So, the grihyasutras suggested that eight lumps of mud be placed in front of the potential bride, each taken from a different place: a field with good yield, a cow-stable, a Vedic altar, a pool, a gambling house, a road crossing, barren land, and a burial ground. Surely, you can see where this is going. The potential bride had to pick one of the lumps. Picked the lump from the cow-stable? Her children will own many cows. Gambling house? They will be addicted to gambling. Road crossing? They will wander the streets as beggars. Vedic altar? They will be enlightened souls!

I suggest that this practice be revived today, with lumps of mud brought instead from Silicon Valley, Oxford, IIT-Bombay, local government office, nearby college of arts, etc.

PV Kane also tells us about a story in the Mahabharata of a woman who preferred not to marry at all. We have all heard of Draupadi, Savitri, and even Maitreyi from the Upanishads, but did you know of the daughter of Sage Kunigarga? She practised the most severe of penances for many years. She had not met a man equal to her, and so she didn’t care to marry. Narada, however, visited her when she was old, and told her that she could not go to heaven unless she was married at the time of her death. So, Kunigarga’s daughter thought for a while and announced that she would marry a man one day before she was to die, and offer him half of the merit gained through her penance. She married Shringavan, who agreed to the deal, for one day, wished him luck, and gave up her body through penance. Shringavan, pining after her, soon died of sorrow.

We don’t know her name, which is rather unfortunate, but with all the rules surrounding marriage, I’m surprised we don’t have more stories like this one!

(The University of Toronto doctoral student in Religion oscillates between scholarly pursuits and abject laziness)