NO. 50. — 1899.] POLYANDRY IN CEYLON. 



5 



witness always spoke of his or her " loku appd " or " kuda 

 <appd" i.e., " elder father " or " younger father." 



I was subsequently in charge of a Province (the North- 

 Central) which, under the name of Nuwarakalawiya, formed 

 part of the Kandyan territory. It is very curious that, 

 although this Province was in some respects the most 

 primitive in Ceylon, I found no custom of polyandry among 

 the people, although it was known to have existed among 

 the chief families, who, of course, were in touch with the 

 families of the up-country Kandyans. The ancient village 

 communal customs still exist there (as in " the Aryan 

 village "), and if polyandry were a survival, it would surely 

 be here rather than in the districts which were adjacent to, 

 and more or less influenced by, Europeans. 



I am therefore inclined to believe that polyandry was 

 evolved " in the feudal times, when the rice lands would 

 have gone to destruction during the long absences enforced 

 on the people by the duty of personal attendance on the 

 king and higher chiefs, had not some interested party been 

 left to conduct their village." # The last dynasty of 

 Kandyan kings were introduced from South India and 

 obtained their queens from Madura, but it is very unlikely 

 that these South Indian princes and their relatives intro- 

 duced the custom of polyandry. 



In my opinion, polyandry has not been " a general 

 system of marriage" in Ceylon, while it is perfectly 

 certain that " group marriage " never existed here during 

 historic times, and the native records go back to the third 

 century B.C. In my experience, the men in a polyandrous 

 marriage were invariably brothers by birth and not by 

 repute. The arrangement was a family one, and did not 

 include connection with a man not a brother of the family. 

 In such a case it would have been considered " adultery," 

 just as much as if it were a modern civilized marriage of 

 one man and one woman. It is true that what we call 



* Tennent, loo. cit. 



