Sarparaju Katre @konerupapi - Twitter Profile

There is nothing modern or post modern here, if anything these women could be transported to VIjayanagara and no one would bat an eyelid. Portuguese travelers who visited Hampi in the 16th century observed that the royal court employed thousands of women as palace guards, wrestling athletes, musicians, and administrative clerks. They documented that during the grand Mahanavami festival, these palace women, along with the royal family, consumed massive quantities of wine and spirits during state celebrations. Incels pushing this theory of "women don't drink saar' are just pushing Islamic and Victorian codes of morality. Our history pre Mlecha has detailed records of women (nobility and commoners) drinking freely. In the work Manallosa, written by Chalukyan king Khamboja in the 12th century, there is an entire chapter on how drinking fine wines (both men and women) is a courtly and elite pursuit. IN Madura Vijayam (written by the Vijayanagara queen, Gangadevi) there is a chapter in which she talks about thesensory descriptions of royal lovers reposing in palace gardens, where the women drink fine liquor to wash away their natural inhibitions, flush their cheeks a rosy red, and prepare for romantic trysts with their partners. Kalingattu Parani (written by Cholar court poet Jayamkondar) references the romantic rituals of the courtly elite, where couples pass cups of sweet fermented palm toddy (Kallu) or sugar-based spirits to one another as a standard prelude to making love. Naiṣadhīya Carita (written by Sri Harsha, the court poet of the Chalukyans) has a highly detailed description of a grand royal feast and wedding banquet. It features elite men and women indulging in exotic wines (Madira). Sriharsha uses intricate wordplay to describe how the wine glass acts as a medium for courtship with lovers playfully admiring the reflection of each other’s eyes in the ruby-colored liquids and comparing the sweetness of the wine to the sweetness of their lover's lips. Purananuru describes women who actively drink potent, mature Kallu from communal jars. The poems detail them eating roasted meats and field fish alongside their husbands, laughing and singing under the shade of neem trees to celebrate the community's prosperity. In the Perumpanarrupadai female farmers (Uzhavathiyar) finishing a grueling day of harvesting paddy or crushing sugarcane. To celebrate the yield, they sit with their husbands on the threshing floors and consume Thoppi (a thick, highly intoxicating rice-wine/toddy brew that had been fermented inside hollow bamboo shoots or earthen pots buried in the ground). The Pattinappalai describes how fishermen and fisherwomen gather on the white sands of the beach under the shade of coastal trees. The literature explicitly notes that both men and women drink fermented palm toddy (Kallu) until they are heavily intoxicated, after which they dance hand-in-hand (Kuravai Koothu) to the beating of folk drums.

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