A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 01: Arranged in Systematic Order: Forming a Complete History of the Origin and Progress of Navigation, Discovery, and Commerce, by Sea and Land, from the Earliest Ages to the Present TimeKerr, Robert
History
A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 01: Arranged in Systematic Order: Forming a Complete History of the Origin and Progress of Navigation, Discovery, and Commerce, by Sea and Land, from the Earliest Ages to the Present Time
Kerr, Robert
Voyages and travels
After having placed the house on the ground, with its door turned to the
south, the bed of the master is placed to the north, opposite the door. The
place of the women is always on the east, or on the masters left hand,
where he sits on his bed with his face to the south, and the place of the
men on his right hand, to the west; and when any men enter into the house,
they never hang up their quivers on the womens side. Over the head of the
lord there is placed an image or puppet of felt, which is called the
masters brother, and a similar image over the head of the mistress, which
is called her brother; and a little higher between these, there is one very
small and thin, which is, as it were, the keeper of the house. The mistress
places at the foot of her bed, on the right hand, in a conspicuous place,
the skin of a kid, stuffed with wool, or some such material, and beside
that a small puppet looking towards the maidens and women. Near the door,
on the womens side of the house, there is another image, with a cows udder,
as the guardian of the women who milk the kine. On the masters side of the
door is another image, having the udder of a mare, being the tutelary deity
of the men who milk the mares. When they meet together for drinking, they,
in the first place, sprinkle the master's idol with some of the liquor, and
then all the rest in their order; after which a servant goes out of the
house with a cup of drink, and sprinkles thrice towards the south, making a
genuflexion between each, in honour of the fire, then towards the east, in
honour of the air, next towards the west, in honour of the water, and
lastly, towards the north, for the dead. When the lord takes the cup in his
hand to drink, he first pours a part on the ground; and if he is to drink
on horseback, he first spills a portion on the neck and mane of his horse.
After the servant has made his libations to the four quarters of the world,
he returns into the house, and two other servants are ready with two other
cups and salvers, to carry drink to the lord and his wife, who sit together
on a bed. When he has more than one wife, she with whom he slept the night
before sits beside him that day, and all the other wives must come to her
house that day to drink; and all the gifts which the lord receives that day
are deposited in her chests. Upon a bench there stands vessels of milk and
other drinks, and drinking cups.
SECTION IV.
_Of their Kinds of Drink, and Fashion of Drinking_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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