continued from Sex Science & India[3]…

Sexuality in the sultanate era:

To better understand the sexuality then,we may try to understand the intrinisic teachings of ISLAM in that respect.

The Prophet’s one great aim was propagation of his religion and as Margoliouth observes, “Abu Bakr (the chief campaigner for Muhammad’s creed) probably was aware that women are more amenable to conversion than men… slaves than freemen, persons in distress than persons in prosperity and affluence.”  Women slaves turned concubines could increase Muslim population by leaps and bounds when captured in large numbers.  Hence there was particular keenness on enslaving women from the very beginning of Islam.

This was also encouraged by the injunctions of the Quran. Muslims are allowed four wives besides they are allowed to cohabit with any of their female slaves. 

In later times, this encouragement to polygamy was taken advantage of by Muslim conquerors. That Muhammad restricted the number of lawful wives but did not restrict the number of slave concubines, came handy to Musalmans. He “thus left upon the minds of his followers the inevitable impression that an unrestricted polygamy was the higher state…” Hazrat Umar, the second Caliph, was the first to allow instant divorce (by the pronouncement of talaq, talaq, talaq, three times) called talaq-i-bidat (innovative form of divorce), “to meet an extraordinary situation brought on by wars of conquests”. Those wars brought in such an influx of women that constant divorce became necessary to falicitate quick acquisition of fresh spouses by divorcing the old ones. “Victory over an enemy would seem to have been consummated only when the enemy’s daughter was introduced into the conqueror’s harem” – a precept so enthusiastically practised by Muslim conquerors and rulers in India.

It is therefore no wonder that from the day the Muslim invaders marched into India to the time when their political power declined, women were systematically captured and enslaved throughout the length and breadth of the country. Two instances pertaining to two extreme points of time would suffice as examples. When Muhammad bin Qasim mounted his attack on Debal in 712, all males of the age of seventeen and upwards were put to the sword and their women and children were enslaved. And after the Third Battle of Panipat (1761), “the unhappy prisoners were paraded in long lines, given a little parched grain and a drink of water, and beheaded… and the women and children who survived were driven off as slaves – twenty-two thousand, many of them of the highest rank in the land, says the Siyar-ut-Mutakhirin.”

Forcible Marriages

Forcible marriages, euphemistically called matrimonial alliances, were common throughout the medieval period. Only some of them find mention in Muslim chronicles with their bitter details.The reason for including such cases of ‘royal marriages’ in the study of sex slavery is obvious. The language of the above citations shows that such wives, or such secondary wives, are always mentioned as having been taken into service or included among female servants, or as obtaining glory by entering the king’s harem.

Distribution of Slave Girls

Marriages brought servants and bandis, but the largest number of slave girls was collected during raids, campaigns and wars throughout the medieval period. It was a consistent policy to kill all males, especially those capable of bearing arms, and enslave their hapless women.Most of the captives were distributed among nobles and soldiers.

Behaviour of Stave Girls

Slave girls may be divided under three categories on the basis of their character and conduct. One set comprised of the ambitious, cunning and crafty who tried to wield influence in the harem. Just the opposite were the simple, docile and submissive. In between were those who were keen to exercise ascendancy but through beauty and tact; they were otherwise loyal and lovable.

Extreme cases of shrewish and termagant women on the one hand and those known for sacrifice and devotion on the other were few. Muslim harems mainly contained attractive women with normal behaviour. In medieval times mutilation and castration were common punishments meted out to men in war and peace and their beautiful women were taken into the harems of the elites. Besides, “silver bodied damsels with musky tresses” were purchased in the slave markets of India and abroad. The harems were thus filled with an assortment of beauties from various countries and nationalities, although Indian women predominated.  Orme, along with many others, affirms that “nature seems to have showered beauty on the fairer sex throughout Hindustan with a more lavish hand than in most other countries.” Their faithfulness and devotion matched their charm. In the harem these amenable creatures were an asset and were welcome in ever larger numbers.

Hijras

Early in the eighteenth century Muslim rule in India set on its path of decline. The harems of royalty and nobility began to suffer from a financial crunch. Many slave girls in these establishments, unable to bear the rigours of penury, left their palaces and mansions and took up quarters in the cities to fend for themselves. Thousands of eunuch guards of the harems also took to the streets when their services were dispensed with or starvation knocked at their doors

In their effort to provide means of livelihood for themselves many slave girls adopted the profession of dancing girls and prostitutes and hundreds of eunuchs, thrown out of employment, turned bhands and hijras. Prostitution is practised the world over, hijras are a people peculiar to India. Basically, and historically, they have come down or ‘descended’ from the medieval eunuchs.

These unfortunate hijras, who have continued as a legacy of the Muslim slave system, still play a pernicious and parasitical role in Indian society. Their aggressive demand for benefaction makes them detested. There are many negative aspects of Muslim slave system of which probably the hijra is the worst. But in medieval times hijras were as essential a part of Muslim society as any other section.

We hope this throws some light on the sexuality in the sultanate era.

The special interest of Muslim emperors in sex slavery was universal and widespread and a plethora of evidence is available in contemporary Persian chronicles. In fact, Muslim historians derive extra delight in narrating anecdotes and stating facts about Muslim indulgence in sex and allied activities. In this background, it would be an unremitting task both in volume and repetition to give all anecdotes, facts and figures of enslavement and concubinage of captive women in the central and provincial kingdoms and independent Muslim states found mentioned in the chronicles.

next coming up is the devadasis and the insights to kamasutra…