HOW TIBETANS MARRY.
, The most curious of the remarkable 3 customs of the country with which our t latest war has brought us in contact is t polyandry. When Warren Hastings sent his first envoy to Tibet, more than a 4 century ago, he specially mentioned this ! custom of the people as one on 2 which he desired information and , since that time it has attracted j the attention of all travellers who have - come iii contact with Tibetan social life. , Polyandry is that species of polygamy in . which the wife has more husbands than , one, aud prevails wherever the Tibetan ! language is spoken, even in districts on j the Indian side of the mountains. It is , found in many other places, such as the j interior of Ceylon, among the Todas and Nairs of Southern India, the Iroquois, | and the aboriginal Tasmanians, but r Tibetan polyandry has the peculiarity ' that the husbands are brother, or, at the . least, very nearly related, so that the . woman becomes the wife of a whole , family. It does not appear to be in any i way connected with the Tibetan religion, i but to owe its existence to the poverty of the'eountry and the to desire limit popu- ; lation. It is practised by all classes of i the population, rich and poor, and is only superseded by polygamy or multiplicity of wives, where the people have been . much in contact with Hindoos or Mohomedan. Tinner, the second of Warren Hastings's envoys to Tibet, say that the number of husbands is not restricted ; at Toshn Lumbo, the residence of the Teshn Lama, bo has known a family of live brothers living happily with one wife aud he thinks this probably is the praetical limit. One woman is spoken of who was married to six brothers, one of whom was quite a boy. A writer attributes the fact "..hat the system works peacefully, to the calm, unimpassioned temperament of the people, who subordinate all other interests to those of the family. The children nro regarded as scions of the house rather than of any individual member of it; all the husbands are treated as the fathers of the children, and there is no noticeable difference in the relations of a child to the different fathers. The surplus women left by the system are provided for in the Lama nunneries, where they learn to read and copy the Tibetan Scriptures, and to engage in the religious services. The choice of a wife for the family is the right of the elder brother, and the eontract lie makes involves marriage contracts with all the other brothers. The system is said to hive existed in Tibet since prehistoric times, so that its origin is lost in inliquity. It litis Ken suggested that it aro-e m a state of society whero men were forced to be away from home for long periods, and whore the duty of protecting the family would fall on the biothiii* in turn. The notable end which it serves is that it restricts I population in regions where emigration ' is difficult, and where the moaus of ' subsistence cannot be easily increased. '
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Waikato Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 2570, 29 December 1888, Page 2 (Supplement)
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526HOW TIBETANS MARRY. Waikato Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 2570, 29 December 1888, Page 2 (Supplement)
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