DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.49708#0070
, THE •
MALDIVES.
Inhabitants.
Meals.
Habitations.
56 SESSIONAL PAPERS, 1881.
profusion of bangles, with necklace, earrings, and other ornaments, deck the person. The
use of gold trinkets is no longer rigidly restricted to women of quality.
Girls, from the time they begin to walk until 9 or 10 years old, wear only a cloth
reaching from the waist to below the knees. Boys are forced to put on waist cloths after
circumcision at the age of seven. “Young children are covered with ornaments of
different metals according to the wealth of their parents to distinguish them from those
whose parents are poorer.”* * * §
MEALS.
The Maldivians have nominally three meals a day—one shortly after rising, with
coffee: another about six hours later, the midday meal: and the third after dark, just
before retiring to rest ;f but among the common folk at least it is rather the practice, as
remarked by Pyrard, to observe “ no set meal times, eating when their appetite provokes
them.”
The usual meal of the natives consists of rice (often only half-boiled) mixed with
a few chopped chillies, a little fish, “fish sugar,” and scraped cocoanut. This they
consume in silence, even when eating in the company, and with a haste that savours of
greediness. A draught of water closes the repast. Betel is universally chewed, and the
guda-guild smoked constantly before and after meals.
For the supply of rice, their staple food, they have to depend entirely on foreign
importation. Those who can afford luxuries indulge in such articles as tea, sugar,
tobacco, biscuits, &c., the consumption of which has much increased since a few “ Moors”
and Pars! traders have opened boutiques at Male.
The women wait on the men at meals and eat after them. Food is commonly
dressed only by women-cooks (M. badu-ge, anhenun).\
HABITATIONS.
The dwellings of the poorer natives consist on some Atols of rows of huts adjoining
one another on either side of the street. The walls are of cocoanut thatch or wattle-and-
daub, with thatched roof. These are little better than the ordinary Tamil cooly “lines”
observable in Ceylon, low-roofed and dark, but not untidily kept. This is the class of
habitations on Gafaru Island, and common also at Male. In the Suvadiva (Huvadii)
Atol the inhabitants appear to live in similar huts, a number of which stand within
kraals or enclosures.§
At Male the upper orders possess houses with a yard or compound attached, substan-
tially built of wood, the posts, beams and rafters of cocoanut or the tough kuradi
(? Pemphis acldula,) with cross sticks of dvburi (Calophyllum inophyllum). The walls,
sometimes boarded, are generally of daub, or mats; cocoanut thatch cover the roof, and
the floor is plastered.
In general about 28 feet long and 12 feet broad and 15 feet high to the top of the
roof, they are dark and cheerless inside, having but one window at most. A partition near
the middle divides the house into two rooms, of which the inner (M. eten-ge; maval-ge) is
reserved for the women, and considered private, whilst the outer room is open to all visitors.
In this public room (M. beru-ge)^ there are two ranges of seats 2 feet high by 4| wide;
the smaller one on the right of the entrance (M. kuda arid) is held to be the more
honorable ; the other (M. bodu arid), carried across the house, is left for persons of less
importance. The degree of respect intended to be shown to anyone is marked by the seat
to which he is invited. The various weapons used at festival sports are ranged on a rough
loft or shelf overhead. Most of these houses contain a few articles of furniture, the most
* Trans. Bom. Geo. Soo., 1836-8, p. 60. t TJiiZ, p. 61.
| The contemptuous term sidi (Pyrard. cisdy'), applied to men who descend to this menial service,
retains its old force.
§ V. s., Note (3), p. 19.
|| The “ malem" apartment (Z&n, Bat. IV., 118) in which il the master of the house sits with bis friends.’
MALDIVES.
Inhabitants.
Meals.
Habitations.
56 SESSIONAL PAPERS, 1881.
profusion of bangles, with necklace, earrings, and other ornaments, deck the person. The
use of gold trinkets is no longer rigidly restricted to women of quality.
Girls, from the time they begin to walk until 9 or 10 years old, wear only a cloth
reaching from the waist to below the knees. Boys are forced to put on waist cloths after
circumcision at the age of seven. “Young children are covered with ornaments of
different metals according to the wealth of their parents to distinguish them from those
whose parents are poorer.”* * * §
MEALS.
The Maldivians have nominally three meals a day—one shortly after rising, with
coffee: another about six hours later, the midday meal: and the third after dark, just
before retiring to rest ;f but among the common folk at least it is rather the practice, as
remarked by Pyrard, to observe “ no set meal times, eating when their appetite provokes
them.”
The usual meal of the natives consists of rice (often only half-boiled) mixed with
a few chopped chillies, a little fish, “fish sugar,” and scraped cocoanut. This they
consume in silence, even when eating in the company, and with a haste that savours of
greediness. A draught of water closes the repast. Betel is universally chewed, and the
guda-guild smoked constantly before and after meals.
For the supply of rice, their staple food, they have to depend entirely on foreign
importation. Those who can afford luxuries indulge in such articles as tea, sugar,
tobacco, biscuits, &c., the consumption of which has much increased since a few “ Moors”
and Pars! traders have opened boutiques at Male.
The women wait on the men at meals and eat after them. Food is commonly
dressed only by women-cooks (M. badu-ge, anhenun).\
HABITATIONS.
The dwellings of the poorer natives consist on some Atols of rows of huts adjoining
one another on either side of the street. The walls are of cocoanut thatch or wattle-and-
daub, with thatched roof. These are little better than the ordinary Tamil cooly “lines”
observable in Ceylon, low-roofed and dark, but not untidily kept. This is the class of
habitations on Gafaru Island, and common also at Male. In the Suvadiva (Huvadii)
Atol the inhabitants appear to live in similar huts, a number of which stand within
kraals or enclosures.§
At Male the upper orders possess houses with a yard or compound attached, substan-
tially built of wood, the posts, beams and rafters of cocoanut or the tough kuradi
(? Pemphis acldula,) with cross sticks of dvburi (Calophyllum inophyllum). The walls,
sometimes boarded, are generally of daub, or mats; cocoanut thatch cover the roof, and
the floor is plastered.
In general about 28 feet long and 12 feet broad and 15 feet high to the top of the
roof, they are dark and cheerless inside, having but one window at most. A partition near
the middle divides the house into two rooms, of which the inner (M. eten-ge; maval-ge) is
reserved for the women, and considered private, whilst the outer room is open to all visitors.
In this public room (M. beru-ge)^ there are two ranges of seats 2 feet high by 4| wide;
the smaller one on the right of the entrance (M. kuda arid) is held to be the more
honorable ; the other (M. bodu arid), carried across the house, is left for persons of less
importance. The degree of respect intended to be shown to anyone is marked by the seat
to which he is invited. The various weapons used at festival sports are ranged on a rough
loft or shelf overhead. Most of these houses contain a few articles of furniture, the most
* Trans. Bom. Geo. Soo., 1836-8, p. 60. t TJiiZ, p. 61.
| The contemptuous term sidi (Pyrard. cisdy'), applied to men who descend to this menial service,
retains its old force.
§ V. s., Note (3), p. 19.
|| The “ malem" apartment (Z&n, Bat. IV., 118) in which il the master of the house sits with bis friends.’