Sati (practice)

Sati (also spelled suttee) is an obsolete Hindu funeral custom where a widow immolates herself on her husband's pyre or commits suicide in another fashion shortly after her husband's death.

Mention of the practice can be dated back to the 4th century BC, while evidence of practice by widows of kings only appears beginning between the 5th and 9th centuries AD. The practice is considered to have originated within the warrior on the Indian subcontinent, gradually gaining in popularity from the 10th century AD and spreading to other groups from the 12th through 18th century AD. The practice was particularly prevalent among some Hindu communities, observed in aristocratic Sikh families, and has been attested to outside South Asia in a number of localities in Southeast Asia, such as in Indonesia and Champa.

Under British rule, the practice was initially tolerated. In the province of Bengal, Sati was attended by a colonial government official, which states Ahmed, "not only seemed to accord an official sanction, but also increased its prestige value". Between 1815 and 1818, the number of Sati in Bengal province doubled from 378 to 839. Under sustained campaigning against Sati by Christian missionaries such as William Carey and Brahmin Hindu reformer such as Ram Mohan Roy, the provincial government banned Sati in 1829. This was followed up by similar laws by the authorities in the princely states of India in the ensuing decades, with a general ban for the whole of India issued by Queen Victoria in 1861. In Nepal, sati was banned in 1920. The Indian Sati Prevention Act from 1988 further criminalised any type of aiding, abetting, and glorifying of sati.

Sati (Sanskrit: सती / satī) is derived from the name of the goddess Sati, who self-immolated because she was unable to bear her father Daksha's humiliation to her husband Shiva.

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