Note 7 — Chapter XI · SOCIAL DIVISIONS—MARRIAGE—FUNERALS—MEDICINE—FESTIVALS.
Reading edition
The custom of several brothers making one woman their common wife, to keep the ancestral property entire and undivided, is said to have had its origin in Khams, where it is at this day extensively practised. The Tibetans of U and Tsang have borrowed it from their cousins of Khams, but it is not universal with them.7 The wife is claimed by the younger brothers as their wife only so long as they continue to live with the eldest one. When they separate from their eldest brother, they cannot ask him to pay compensation for their share in the wife, and she remains the lawful wife of the eldest brother. It is not unusual for a father or uncle to live with his son’s or nephew’s wife, and even in high life a father makes himself a partner in the marital rights over his son’s wife.8