Zenana

Zenana (Hindustani zanána or janana; Persian zanān, 'women'), the apartments in which Indian women are secluded, corresponding to the harem in Arabic-speaking Moslem lands. In India the Mohammedan women are much in the same position as the women in the other less bigoted Mohammedan countries. Amongst those of the Hindu faith the women of all castes are more or less secluded. Especially among the well-to-do and wealthy and in the higher castes the women were strictly confined to the apartments reserved for them—often those looking into an inner quadrangle—and were never to be seen in public. This usage, like many Hindu usages, does not seem to be based on the oldest Hindu scriptures; but it has been very strictly observed till of late, when the influences of European education and zenana missions have, in the larger towns, done much to relieve the monotony of the Hindu women's lives. Till about 1860, when zenana missions were organised in Bengal by Mr Fordyce, Christian women were not allowed to enter a Hindu zenana. Now thousands of Hindu ladies are taught by British, American, and native Christian women, some of whom are completely trained medical missionaries.