Widows under Hindu Law

This book comprises the first exhaustive history of the treatment and status of widows under classical Hindu law or Dharmaśāstra, as it is called in Sanskrit. As such, this book is intended both to contribute to our understanding of how elite male attitudes toward women evolved during precolonial pe...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Brick, David J. (Author)
Format: Electronic Book
Language:English
Check availability: HBZ Gateway
Fernleihe:Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste
Published: New York, NY Oxford University Press 2023
In:Year: 2023
Series/Journal:Rocher Indology series
Further subjects:B Widows (Hindu law)
B Law
B Laws of specific jurisdictions & specific areas of law
Online Access: Volltext (kostenfrei)
Parallel Edition:Erscheint auch als: 9780197664544
Description
Summary:This book comprises the first exhaustive history of the treatment and status of widows under classical Hindu law or Dharmaśāstra, as it is called in Sanskrit. As such, this book is intended both to contribute to our understanding of how elite male attitudes toward women evolved during precolonial periods in South Asia and to provide crucial context for important colonial debates on Hindu widow remarriage and the Hindu custom of widow self-immolation, or sati. The Dharmaśāstra tradition spans over two millennia of South Asian history, from approximately the third century BCE to the eighteenth century CE. During this time, Hindu jurists treated at length and at times hotly debated four widow-related issues: widow remarriage and levirate, a widow’s right to inherit her husband’s estate, widow asceticism, and sati. Thus, this book is arranged into four chapters, one devoted to each of these four topics. In addition, it contains a summary, where an attempt is made to synthesize the major conclusions drawn in the book’s four main chapters, and an appendix, which addresses a widow’s right to adopt a son—a fifth widow-related issue that became the topic of some discussion in late Dharmaśāstra works and was a significant point of legal contention during the colonial period.
Item Description:Also issued in print: 2023. - "This is an open access publication, available online and distributed under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution - Non Commercial - No Derivatives 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)"--Title page verso. - Includes bibliographical references and index. - Description based on online resource; title from home page (viewed on March 28, 2023)
ISBN:0197664571
Access:Open access.
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780197664544.001.0001