SOAS Research Online

Abstract

Matrimonial relations between Rajput kingdoms formed the basis of the regional polity in Rajputana since its formation. Colonial and colonial inspired historiography transformed the cultural complexities of these royal polygamous marriages into stereotypical tropes without reference to the region’s own archives and histories, thereby creating entirely new discursive objects that now dominate the epistemology of the subject. This dissertation aims to recover the lived realities of these polygamous marriages from local and vernacular sources in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. By looking at how duties and responsibilities were constituted for men and women in an age of widespread violence, it examines the ideologies and actions that constituted rajputai, i.e., the act of being Rajput. In this context, it opens up new ways of viewing death-seeking by the male warrior and the female sati within the Rajput community. Through contemporary accounts of life in the janana for both Rajput and non- Rajput women, it reveals worldviews regarding love, marriage, and domesticity that are distinctly different from dominant modern ideas.