The Predicament of Women in Ancient India - Paperback

by Klaus Bruhn (Author)

Prof. Dr. Klaus Bruhn, former head of department of Indian History Of Arts, Freie Universit t Berlin, Germany, well known for the development of an advanced method for classification of Jaina iconography, is author of this extraordinary book.

Table of Content

01] Introduction
02] The Deterioration of the Position of Women
03] Eight Forms of Marriage and Other Chains
04] The Son and the Beyond
05] Early Marriage of Girls
06] Avoiding Lack of Sons
06.00] Avoiding Lack of Sons
06.01] Obtaining Sons through Magic
06.02] Putrika As A Substitute For A Son
06.03] Adoption
07] Marriage
07.01] Dowry and Bride-Price
07.02] Marriage and Married Life
08] Daily Life (of Wives and Women)
08.01] Housework
08.02] Wife and husband, wife and parents-in-law
08.03] Wife and Ritual
08.04] Menstruation, impurity of women in general
08.05] Pardah
08.06] Greatness of the son, greatness of the mother
08.07] Perpetual tutelage
08.08] The daughter
08.09] Miscellany
09] Specific Events in the Life of Women
09.01] Widowhood and Niyoga
09.02] Monogamy, Supersession, and Polygamy
09.03] Adultery
09.04] Sins of Men and Sins of Women
09.05] Remarriage of Women
09.06] The Widow's Right of Inheritance
09.07] Feticide and Female Infanticide
10] Varia
10.11] Devadasis
10.12] Prostitution in General
11] The Woman in the Epics
11.01] General
11.02] Mahabharata: Story of Savitri
11.03] Ramayana: Sita Twice Repudiated
12] Widowhood and Suttee
12.00] Widowhood and Suttee
12.01] Suttee as recorded up to about 300 A.D.
12.02] Suttee after 300 A.D.
12.03] Widowhood after 100 B.C.
12.04] Suttee, Mainly 18th and 19th Centuries
12.05] Widowhood Past and Present
12.06] Two Attitudes
12.07] Debates on Suttee
12.08] Theories on Suttee
13] Woman in Hinduism (Varia)
13.01] Introduction
13.02] The Female in Hindu Iconography
13.03] Hindu Mythology
13.04] Tantrism and Shaktism
13.05] Nuns and Saint Singers in Hinduism
14] Widow Burning in Bali
15] Glossary
16] General Bibliography
17] Specialized Bibliography

Author Biography

Ph.D.: Hamburg 1954 (Thesis: Silankas Cauppannamahapurisacariya [a Jaina text in Prakrit]; Publication: Hamburg 1954).

Sojourn in India, incl. 1954-57 (collecting materials for a monograph on the Jaina art of Deogarh).

Habilitation: Hamburg 1964 (Thesis: The Jina-Images of Deogarh; Publication: E. J. Brill, Leiden 1969).

Academic teachers: WALTHER SCHUBRING and LUDWIG ALSDORF.

Professorship for Indology at the Free University of Berlin, 1966.

Retired since 1991.

Teaching and Research Subjects: Indian Philology and Indian Art History (with the specialization on Jaina art).

Numerous publications regarding Jaina literature and art (1970 ff.).

Prakrit Jñanabharati International Award 2006