WOMEN WITH TEN HUSBANDS.

Taranaki Daily News, 4 February 1922, Page 10

WOMEN WITH TEN HUSBANDS.

LIFE IN HIDDEN TIBET. ♦

An account of life in a remote part of Tibet, where women propose to men, and have as many as 10 husbands by marrying a whole family of brothers at the same time was given to a representative of the Daily Mail by Mr. F. W. Thomas, Chief Librarian at the Indian Office and Reader in Tibetan in London University, who spent his holidays in the mysterious land beyond the Himalayas, whence he has just returned “I started from Kalimpong, east of Darjeeling, on a 14-days’ journey through strange and wonderful country to Gyantse, six days’ travel from Lhassa,” he said.

“All the way to Gyantse there are sleeping bungalows made by the British Government for the benefit of trade agents. At Gyantse there is a British trade agent, who lives in a fqrt protected by 50 Indian sepoys and a lieutenant of the Indian Army. There is also a British Post Office and an Indian doctor.

“I went into the Tibetan monasteries on the way and spent long hours poring over age-old manuscripts ano books with priests and lamas. Their literature represents the mediaeval thought of India and is full of abstruse metaphysics. The lamas and priests wear high boots of cloth which lace up at the back, long trousers, and a long coat woven of yak hair.

“The monks make their own guns for their army, which they form themselves. They also make their own swords, which have two edges, but rifles are imported. “The women I met wore robust and unveiled and wear skirts and bodices, and tie their somewhat plentiful hair in a framework above their heads. They marry a whole family of brothers at the same time.

“If there are 10 brothers in the family she decides to marry, the woman marries them all. I suppose it is because there are fewer women in Tibet than men. The courting is done in the ordinary go-between system of the East, but the Tibetan woman has a great deal io say in her choice of the family into which s]\e will marry.

“A wedding ceremony in Tibet is a complicated and curious affair. Early in the morning of the wedding day the father and mother give a farewell banquet in the house of the bride. After the banquet the priest preaches to the bride, standing before her. Here and there in his sermon he inserts a story which deeply impresses the bride. When it is all over she leaves her father’s house on horseback, tjiat is, of course, among the higher circles, and proceeds to the house of the bridegroom, where an invitation sword is thrown at her to intimidate evil spirits. “Further ceremonies take place and sour milk is brought out. After drinking it the bride is admitted. She marries the brother or brothers at the same time or at intervals, but sometimes the bride, and her brothers-in-law live together at their pleasure without having any formal ceremony to celebrate their weddings. In the best families care -is taken to see that all the brothers are not at home at the same time. If one brother is at home the other absents himself.

“The women have fine natural voices, and at Gyantse a Tibetan opera was performed in my honor. It lasted five or six hours. Famous actors and actresses from Lhassa with a distinct type of beauty acted mythological scenes of the birth of Buddha in a previous life, in which he displayed wonderful liberality, giving away all his wealth to beggars.” “The men and wdmen players sang all through the play, and the music of trumpets and drums was not disagreeable by any means. The costumes were weird, gorgeous, and wonderful. In the middle of the play pots of Tibetan barley beer were handed round. The men have good voices as well as the women. I believe it is due to the climate.

“On my way back I stopped at a little schol for boys and girls in charge of Mrs. McDonald. I asked her to make her little Tibetan pupils sing, and after a minute or so I realised that they were singing the song we used to sing in our own schools, ■‘This is the way we wash our hands’ in Tibetan.