Among the
same people, he says, the newly-married wife must conceal her
face from her husband for two months after marriage, and only
then yield to his embraces. (Mantegazza, _La Donna_, cap. IV.)
"The beauty of a Chinese woman," says Dr. Matignon, "resides
largely in her foot. 'A foot which is not deformed is a
dishonor,' says a poet. For the husband the foot is more
interesting than the face. Only the husband may see his wife's
foot naked. A Chinese woman is as reticent in showing her feet to
a man as a European woman her breasts. I have often had to treat
Chinese women with ridiculously small feet for wounds and
excoriations, the result of tight-bandaging. They exhibited the
prudishness of school-girls, blushed, turned their backs to
unfasten the bandages, and then concealed the foot in a cloth,
leaving only the affected part uncovered. Modesty is a question
of convention; Chinese have it for their feet," (J. Matignon, "A
propos d'un Pied de Chinoise," _Archives d'Anthropologie
Criminelle_, 1898, p. 445.)
Among the Yakuts of Northeast Siberia, "there was a well-known
custom according to which a bride should avoid showing herself or
her uncovered body to her father-in-law. In ancient times, they
say, a bride concealed herself for seven years from her
father-in-law, and from the brothers and other masculine
relations of her husband.
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