Life of a Courtesan in 19th Century India

India experienced tremendous wealth during the Nawab era and welcomed all forms of artistic expression from all areas of life in the nineteenth century. The nawabi tehzeeb and tameez were learned in the Havelis, where courtesans once resided. They also studied classical music and danced with other female housemates. Courtesans were crucial to India's cultural advancement.

An Indian courtesan wearing her ghungroos. Image source: The Indian Express

The profession of courtesans is regarded as being the oldest in the world. Not many know how these professional female musicians and dancers, also known as "tawaifs" in North India; changed patronage of music in the twenty-first century by using their music and dance as a kind of empowerment. They were referred to as "dancing and singing girls" who took part in the siege of Lucknow as well as the uprising against British control. This story explores the more nuanced history of the communities of the courtesans—the North Indian tawaif.

The position of a courtesan has been reduced in today's modern world, especially in the capitalistic world, to transactional sex. But what is now considered a "business of providing pleasure" was previously merely a cultural exchange in which sex was ancillary.

Courtesans used to play the role of organic intellectuals through their music, talk about music, and themselves, offering a meta-commentary to and about their larger community and putting forward specific challenges to the status quo in the genre of oral literacy criticism.

They used to receive extensive training in classical dance and music from highly qualified male tutors. They committed themselves to the vigorous practice of their craft and later to its presentation in front of informed, primarily male audiences who provided them with patronage. However, individuals who found it difficult to support themselves through their performances frequently added sex work to aid their income.

Nautch dancers in India. Image source: Royal Historical Society Blog

In India, courtesans had a rich cultural and musical heritage and enjoyed social and aesthetic privileges. Royal sponsorship of the courtesans came to an abrupt end when the British usurped the Kingdom of Awadh in 1856 and forced the king and many of his courtiers into exile. It was found that sickness had killed more Europeans during the mutiny and revolt of 1857 than in actual warfare.

The embarrassing truth that one in every four European soldiers had a venereal disease added to the shock of this finding. It soon became apparent that the fight to lower European death rates would now include the sanitary front to maintain a capable European army for the empire's strategic requirements. Regulation, oversight, and supervision of the courtesans and prostitutes in Lucknow, as well as those in the other Indian cantonments where European soldiers were stationed, became essential. The introduction of contagious disease laws and the implementation of severe fines and punishments against courtesans for their participation in the uprising signalled the eventual degradation of a revered cultural institution into regular prostitution.

Under the British, Indian courtesans were left in a very precarious and insecure situation despite having once socialised with kings and courtiers, lived in opulence, protected culture, and dictated fashion trends.

Manjari Chaturvedi’s performance on Day 2 of India Couture Week. Image source: Google

Today, the performance traditions of these courtesans are being preserved by NGOs like Guria Sewi Sansthan through celebration on a national scale, in which the organisation puts its socially outcast members and their undervalued performance traditions on display on the public stage in mainstream venues. They can re-contextualize and reinforce their artistic identity as a result. They are also combating negative stereotypes of themselves and their work through their performances. As a result, the courtesan traditions are at risk of disappearing and its keepers are subject to severe social exclusion. Today, the courtesans of India live in dangerous and impoverished red-light districts, where patrons are frequently more interested in sex than music, and the songs their "patrons" want to hear have little to do with the rich traditions these women uphold.

The banishment of the courtesans was not merely the loss of a cultural form. It was the forceful taking of agency and respect from people who previously enjoyed sexual and economic independence and a position in the respectable world—things that the expanding patriarchy detested.