Remarriage And Multiple Marriage

Following separation, divorce, or the death of his wife, a man may, usually in the case where there are no children (or no surviving children), enter a new principal marriage, that is, a marriage for producing children for the support of the lineage and the household. In this

case there would usually be, as in a first marriage, a major marriage ceremony. It would be a primary marriage for his new wife and the marriage would be as carefully arranged as was the first marriage.

A woman, following separation, divorce, or widowhood, can marry again, but this would be, for her, a (truly) secondary marriage, and she would have a minor marriage ceremony. In this respect it does not matter whether her previous marriage had been terminated formally, in divorce or death, or simply through an informal separation.^[29] We may note again here that widows can remarry, and the younger ones, at least, often do. This is in the context of the relative lack of social or ritual stigma attached to Newar widowhood. It was, as we have noted, specifically to prevent the problems and stigmatization of widowhood characteristic of other Hindu communities that, in local legand, the Ihi ceremony was founded by Parvati, whose natal home was the Himalayan area, and who had been given the Kathmandu Valley by her father for her dowry.

Whatever the form of marriage or of marriage ceremony the woman becomes a misa^[30] or "wife." In the case where there are (at once or in sequence) more than one they are often designated as first wife, ha:thu , and later wife (or wives) lithu . One common explanation for a multiple marriage, that is, where the first wife is kept in the household and a lithu added, is a failure to have children, which is almost always ascribed to barrenness of the first wife and not the sterility of the husband. In most cases when a second wife is taken for this purpose, the first wife (who is otherwise likely to be a satisfactory wife and daughter-in-law) remains in the household.^[31] Multiple marriage for this reason is relatively common in Chathariya and Pa(n)cthariya households where the household can afford the expense of marrying and maintaining another wife. Farming households sometimes take second wives even if there are children by the first marriage, if the first wife is, for example, chronically ill and unable to help sufficiently with the household and farmwork. They may also do so sometimes even if the first wife is healthy if there are large farm holdings and a second wife could profitably help in the farmwork. Other additional marriages, which are considered permissible but by many as not really "decent," are those initiated by (and "for the sake of") the husband, not the household, and explained variously as owing to the first wife's lack of sexual attractiveness or the man's excessive sexual lust, or because of some dislike for his first wife in a situation where separation for one reason or another is difficult.

Polygamous marriages are generally considered to be stressful for

everyone concerned, particularly if there are children from both wives. They are confined to wealthier households and compared to non-Newar Hindu Nepalis seem to be relatively rare. Lynn Bennett, in her study of an Indo-Nepalese Hindu community, reports that among eighty-eight married men, seventeen had more than one wife, several had three wives, and one man had five (1977, 327). In contrast, G. S. Nepali (1965, 237) found among 256 married Newar men only eight who had more than one wife.^[32] The relative lack of polygamy among Newars in spite of their comparative wealth is another aspect of the Newar wife's relatively superior status in Hindu context.