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Kettu Kalyanam, also known as Thali Kettu, was the name of an elaborate marriage ceremony of the Samanthan, Nair, Maarar, and Ambalavasi communities of the southern Indian state of Kerala. The customs varied from region to region and caste to caste. Sambandham (a matrilineal form of informal marriage) might take place only if the bride had already had this elaborate ritual mock-marriage known as Kettu Kalyanam. The Kettu Kalyanam is ceremonial only, for after the rituals the groom returns to his house, never to meet the bride again. In some parts of Malabar immediately after the ceremony, a formal divorce is constituted, whereas in other areas the groom enters into sambandham with the girl and becomes her husband in practice, if the girl be of marriageable age.
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Among the communities that practiced the custom, a grand ceremony would be held at its oldest ancestral house. All the girls of appropriate age of the lineage of one generation were ritually married to chosen bridegrooms of enangar (linked neighborhood kinship groups not of the same family group as the brides). This ceremony, called tālikettukalyānam ("tāli-tying ceremony") had to be performed for each girl before puberty, on pain of her excommunication from her caste. [1] At the ceremony, each bridegroom, in the company of representatives of every household in the neighbourhood, tied a gold ornament (a tāli) round the neck of his bride. [2] Each couple was then secluded in a room of the ancestral house for three days and nights. On the fourth day the bridegrooms departed; they had no further obligations, and did not need to visit the brides again.
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After the tāli ritual, a girl was regarded as having attained the status of a mature woman, ready to bear children to perpetuate her lineage. This social recognition of marriageability was entirely separate from community acknowledgement of physical maturity upon reaching puberty. For that, there was a separate ceremony, Thirandu Kalyanam, performed at a girl's menarche.
The tāli-tying ritual was both a religious and legal ceremony between the lineage and enangu group, and thus can be seen as a form of mass marriage, even though it is in practice only a mock-marriage, while the later sambandham are actual marriages.
The Nair also known as Nayar, are a group of Indian Hindu castes, described by anthropologist Kathleen Gough as "not a unitary group but a named category of castes". The Nair include several castes and many subdivisions, not all of whom historically bore the name 'Nair'. These people lived, and continue to live, in the area which is now the Indian state of Kerala. Their internal caste behaviours and systems are markedly different between the people in the northern and southern sections of the area, although there is not very much reliable information on those inhabiting the north.
A Hindu wedding, also known as Vivaha, Marathi: Lagna (लग्न), Bengali: Bibaho (বিবাহ), Kalyanam, Kannada script: ಮದುವೆ (Maduve), Tamil: திருமணம் (Tirumanam), or Pelli, is the traditional wedding ceremony for Hindus. The wedding ceremonies are very colourful, and celebrations may extend for several days and usually a large number of people attend the wedding functions. The bride's and groom's home—entrance, doors, wall, floor, roof—are sometimes decorated with colors, flowers, and other decorations.
Sambandham was a mode of marriage followed by Nambudiris, Nairs, Samantha Kshatriyas, Kshatriyas and Ambalavasis among their own communities as well as with each other, in colonial Kerala, India. This practice was stopped during the late 1920s, and is no longer observed.
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The Nambudiri, also transliterated as Nampoothiri, Nambūdiri, Namboodiri, Namboothiri and Nampūtiri, are a Malayali Brahmin caste, native to what is now the state of Kerala, India, where they constituted part of the traditional feudal elite. Headed by the Azhvanchery Thamprakkal Samrāṭ, the Nambudiris were the highest ranking caste in Kerala. They owned a large portion of the land in the region of Malabar, and together with the Nair monarchs, the Nambudiris formed the landed aristocracy known as the Jenmimar, until the Kerala Land Reforms starting in 1957. Naturalized Tulu Brahmins who took up Nambudiri customary ways are known as Embranthiri Brahmins.
Naduvazhi were feudatory princes who ruled over microstates that are now administrative parts of Kerala, India. They constituted the aristocratic class within the Hindu caste system and were either kings themselves or nobility in the service of the kings of Kerala.
Marriage in Pakistan pertains to wedding traditions established and adhered by Pakistani men and women. Despite their local and regional variations, marriages in Pakistan generally follow Islamic marital jurisprudence. Marriages are not only seen as a union between a husband and a wife, but also an alliance between their respective families. These traditions extend to other countries around in the world where Overseas Pakistani communities exist.
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Punjabi wedding traditions are a strong reflection of Punjabi culture with ritual, song, dance, food, and dress that have evolved over centuries.
In Chinese tradition, a Ghost Marriage is a marriage in which one or both parties are deceased. In mainland China, the practice of Ghost Marriage involves two deceased individuals. In Taiwan and South East Asia, this practice involves with one deceased and one living.
Eleanor Kathleen Gough Aberle was a British anthropologist and feminist who was known for her work in South Asia and South-East Asia. As a part of her doctorate work, she did field research in Malabar district from 1947 to 1949. She did further research in Tanjore district from 1950 to 1953 and again in 1976, and in Vietnam in 1976 and 1982. In addition, some of her work included campaigning for: nuclear disarmament, the civil rights movement, women's rights, the third world and the end of the Vietnam War. She was known for her Marxist leanings and was on an FBI watchlist.
There are numerous ceremonies and customs adopted by the Nair caste, which is prominent in the South Indian state of Kerala.
Kiryathil Nair or Kiriyath Nair is a Kshatriya subdivison of Nair caste, of martial nobility, having performed the functions of Kshatriyas in Kerala, India.They also did business, industry, medicine and accounting.But as they were Kshatriya sub-division their main occupation was martial nobility.
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Bangladesh did not exist as a distinct geographic and ethnic unity until independence. The region had been a part of Bangla, Bengali: বাংলা/বঙ্গ, whose history dates back to four millennia, and during the British period it formed the Bengal province, the eastern part of the British Indian Empire, which was dominated by the British rulers and Hindu professional, commercial, and landed elites. After the establishment of Pakistan in 1947, present-day Bangladesh came under the hegemony of the non-Bengali Muslim elites of the West Wing of Pakistan. The establishment of Bangladesh, therefore, implied the formation of both a new nation and a new social order.
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