Previously, I had written about Kerala’s matrilineal family system. The article explained in general about how the lineage works from mother to daughter. But what happens when a family runs out of daughters? This is when adoption enters the picture and complicates relationships.
In patrilineal family systems, adoption of an unmarried boy to continue the family line is the norm. In Kerala, the Nambudiri brahmins followed such patrilineal family systems just like brahmins elsewhere in India. But their form of adoption, called dwayamushiyana, which was in vogue before the fourth century CE throughout India, went out of fashion among brahmins elsewhere in India around that time. Under this form of adoption, the adoptee was entitled to the properties of both his natural and adopted fathers.¹
Another practice among the patrilineal Nambudiri brahmins in Kerala was adoption by marriage, called sarwaswadam.² According to this practice, the son of the daughter of a family continued her father’s lineage rather than her husband’s. Her son was adopted as her father’s son, and became, in legal terms, her own brother. It was another practice that had gone out of vogue among brahmins elsewhere in India around the turn of the fourth century CE.³
In contrast, in Kerala’s matrilineal families, there were two types of adoption that were commonly used: one was the straightforward adoption of an unmarried girl in childhood; the other was adoption by marriage, called kudiveppu കുടിവെപ്പ്, common where the spouses were from the same community.
To explain the straightforward adoption of a girl, below is an example. In the picture, three generations are depicted: gen1, gen2, and gen3. Direct descent is denoted by solid lines and marriage relations are denoted by dotted lines. The families are represented by colored circles: purple for the Purple family, blue for the Blue family, yellow for the Yellow family, teal for the Teal family, and green for the Green family. The relations are as follows: In gen1, Malu of the Blue family is married to Alagan of the Yellow family. Itti, who is Malu’s brother is married to Akki of the Purple family. Malu and Alagan have a daughter, Panki in gen2. Akki and Itti have two sons in gen2, namely, Ankan, who is married to Panki; and Chathan, who is married to Thangam of the Teal family. Ankan and Panki have two children in gen3, Ammini and Sasi. Chathan and Thangam have one son, Kandan.
Since Akki and Itti have no daughters, under matrilineal rules, their descendants will not belong to the Purple family, and the line will go extinct. The Purple family adopts Paru, who is the sister of Thangam from the Teal Family (see red arrow in the picture below) so that she becomes the amma of the Purple family in gen2 after Akki. Archa, who is the daughter of Paru and Manian will now belong to the Purple family and she will be the amma after Paru. Note that Archa and Kandan are technically first cousins, being children of sisters; however, they will be considered as belonging to entirely different families because of the adoption. Historically, in Kerala, this sort of adoption was common between the royal houses of Mavelikkara and Travancore.
To explain the other form of adoption, namely kudiveppu, I have retained the example above, with minor modifications. As before, Itti and Akki have sons Ankan and Chathan. Under matrilineal rules, their descendants will not belong to the Purple family, and the line will go extinct. Now Panki, who is the daughter of Malu and Alagan is adopted by marriage into the family (see red arrow) when she marries Ankan. She then becomes the amma of the Purple family in gen2 after Akki. Thus, in gen3, Ammini and Sasi, who are the children of Panki and Ankan, will belong to the Purple family, so that the family line can be continued with Ammini being the next amma in gen3.
This kudiveppu practice was rare in royal families in Kerala as marriages were usually between the men of the royal family and non-royal women. The practice was more common in non-royal communities. The married woman who was adopted lost all rights to property of her birth family, and gained all the rights of a daughter in her adopted family.
Notes
[1] Govindan Nambiar, 1899, A Handbook of Malabar Law and Usage, 62 (Madras: Gopaul Naidu & Co.) Another form of adoption among brahmins is the chanchamatha adoption, according to which the adoptee loses all rights to his birth family’s property.
[2] Achyuta Menon, 1911, The Cochin State Manual, 33 (Ernakulam: Cochin Government Press).
[3] That both these traditions continued with the Nambudiri brahmins in Kerala suggests that they immigrated to Kerala sometime before fourth century CE.
