VL 6 Courtesans Devadasi Temple Women

Question 1

Auspiciousness and non- conventional women role-models

Answer 1

Auspiciousness: śubha, maṅgala, kalyāṇa (welfare, good fortune, happiness, and prosperity)
Applied to:
* time (month, day)
* major life events: childbirth, puberty, marriage (vs. inauspicious death)
* places (pilgrimage spot, tīrtha)
* objects (water pot, ornaments)
* persons (gods, fertile woman, king)
* union of male and female: stable state of auspiciousness

Question 2

Women and auspiciousness:

Answer 2

• Yakṣī, Śālabhañjikā, Apsaras, Kanyā…
• Women and trees
• Apsaras

Question 3

Apsaras,
“[she] who moves (sṛ-) in
the water (āp)”

Answer 3

• Semidivine female beings
• Water spirits
• Wives of gandharvas
• Celestial dancers (also dancing at the court of Indra and sent by Indra to disturb those who perform tapas)
• Experts in the 64 arts
• Kaiśikī vṛtti, “the gorgeous style” of dance (described in the Nāṭyaśāstra)

Question 4

Auspiciousness and dance

Answer 4

Given that dramatic acting has been devised by those experts in theatre for the sake of attaining its objects, why indeed has this dance been devised and what is the nature to which it conforms? It is not connected with the contents of the songs, nor does it bring any object into being. Why has this dance been devised in connection with songs?
On this point, it is said that dance does not indeed conform to any object, but it is meant to generate beauty (śobhā); that is why dance has come into use. Generally, everybody likes dance in itself. Moreover, this dance is praised because it is considered auspicious (maṅgalya). And on occasions such as weddings, the birth of a child, welcoming a new child-inlaw, jubilation, success, and so forth, it is a cause of merriment. That is
why this dance has come into use.
(Nāṭyaśāstra Ch. 4)

Question 5

Devadāsīs in modern ethnographic accounts (Marglin, Srinivasan, Kersenboom)

Answer 5

• Describe temple women within the framework of Indian society and religion
• Question the primary link of temple women with prestitution
• Define them by three characteristics:
  1. Hereditary status, i.e. birth or adoption into a particular community
  2. Her status depends on ritual dedication to temple service through a ceremony of “marriage” to the temple deity
  3. Professional expertise: mastery of a dance tradition

Question 6

The Devadāsī institution

Answer 6

• Dāsīs, or Deva-dāsis: Hindu women attached to temples for the service to the deity, temple servants, unmarried
• Described in late 19th and early 20th centuries ethnographic accounts: temple women as dancing girl and prostitute
• This interpretation has been assumed as mainstream and problematically superimposed on the early mediaval and medieval period, if not earlier
• 1947: ban on the Devadāsī-dedication

Question 7

Four prejudices in vogue in early perceptions on Devadāsīs (Orr 2000)

Answer 7

(1) theassumptionthatthereisapan-Indianandtranshistorical devadāsī phenomenon;
(2) the idea of the degeneration of the devadāsī institution;
(3) the notion of the devadāsī as the passive victim of social forces or
elite interests;
(4) thefocusonthedevadāsī’sroleasbeingdefinedprimarilywith respect to her identity as a woman, in terms either of her sexuality or of her representation of some peculiarly feminine power.

Question 8

Temple women and Devadāsī

Answer 8

”In my definition of this group of women, I consider a temple woman to be a woman-who may or may not be a prostitute or a dancer-who is associated with a temple, either by having some kind of regular service function in a temple or because her primary social identity is defined with reference to a temple”.
(Orr , Leslie, 2000. Donors. Devotees, and Daughters of God: Temple Women in Medieval Tamilnadu)

“The word devadāsī has attained widespread usage since the revival of Indian classical dance , first begun in Tamilnadu in the 192os. lt has become a pan-Indian word, whereas traditionally each region had its own term to designate temple dancers”
(Apfell Marglin, F., 1985. Wives of the God-King: the Rituals of the Devadasis of Puri)

Question 9

How old is the institution of the Devadāsīs?

Answer 9

• We do not know exactly
• No Devadāsīs in the Nāṭyaśāstra (beginning of the Common Era), there are dancers (nartakī), but nothing is said about their social background or lifestyle, no evidence of temples
• Rudragāṇikas (Rudra’s courtesans), in the Śivadharmottara (7th c.), or earlier in Kālidāsa’s Meghadūta (4th/5th c.)
• The Kuṭṭanīmata (“The Bawd’s Counsel”) (8th c.) depicts a troupe of women actresses residing permanently at a temple and performing Sanskrit theatre

Question 10

Temple women/dancers/prostitutes in literature

Answer 10

Oh cloud, even if you reach Mahākāla at another time, you should stay until the sun has come into the range of your vision. Performing the praiseworthy function of a paṭaha drum for the twilight worship of Śiva with the spear, you will obtain the entire result of the rumbling sounds with the deep tones. (34)
With the girdles tinkling due to their footsteps, their hands tired from the fly whisks playfully shaken, the folds of their belly exposed by the splendour of jewels, the courtesans (veśyā) there, receiving from you the first drops of rain, soothing their nail scratches, will cast at you side glances, which are long like rows of bees. (35)
Then, at the beginning of the dance of Paśupati, clinging to the high forest of trees that are his arms in the form of a nimbus, bearing the vespertine splendour, red like the fresh flower of china rose, remove his desire for the fresh elephant hide. Bhavānī will see your devotion with motionless eyes, in which all anxieties have been pacified. (36)
(Kālidāsa’s Meghadūta 34-36, 4th-5th c.)

Question 11

Temple sculptures and Devadāsīs

Answer 11

• Sculptures and bas-reliefs of dance scenes or poses in ritualistic settings (already in Buddhist stupas and later in Hindu temples)
• Visual images that are to be seen by devotees and temple visitors
• Representations of the 108 karaṇas (dance movements) of the
  Nāṭyaśāstra on the temple walls