A was a kind of bridal dress in the

Vedic period The Vedic period, or the Vedic age (), is the period in the late Bronze Age and early Iron Age of the history of India when the Vedic literature, including the Vedas (ca. 1300–900 BCE), was composed in the northern Indian subcontinent, betw ...

in India. It was made of

cotton Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus ''Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure cellulose, and can contain minor perce ...

wool Wool is the textile fibre obtained from sheep and other mammals, especially goats, rabbits, and camelids. The term may also refer to inorganic materials, such as mineral wool and glass wool, that have properties similar to animal wool. As ...

, and

animal skin Skin is the layer of usually soft, flexible outer tissue covering the body of a vertebrate animal, with three main functions: protection, regulation, and sensation. Other animal coverings, such as the arthropod exoskeleton, have different de ...

. After the ceremony, the wedding dress was given to a Brahmin.

Raiment of Vedic Aryans

The study of

vedic literature upright=1.2, The Vedas are ancient Sanskrit texts of Hinduism. Above: A page from the '' Atharvaveda''. The Vedas (, , ) are a large body of religious texts originating in ancient India. Composed in Vedic Sanskrit, the texts constitute the ...

reveals that the vedic

Aryan Aryan or Arya (, Indo-Iranian *''arya'') is a term originally used as an ethnocultural self-designation by Indo-Iranians in ancient times, in contrast to the nearby outsiders known as 'non-Aryan' (*''an-arya''). In Ancient India, the term ' ...

s were fond of ornaments and were well dressed, they wore different colored clothes also with gold embellishments. Raiment was similar for both men and women, with variations in wearing style. The Vasas, or lower garment, and the adhivasas, or upper garment, were the most common clothes worn by Rigvedic Aryans.'Nivi' (undergarment) was used in the later periods. The people also wore Atka' (a garment) and Drapi (a cloak). Female dancers wore an embroidered outfit. At the wedding ceremony, the bride wore a vadhuya. Vadhuya is referred as a bridal garment in Rv. x. 85, 34; Av. xiv. 2, 41. Cf. Kausika Sutra, lxxix. 21 ; Asvalayana Grhya Sutra, i. 8, 12, etc.

References

Hindu religious clothing Indian clothing {{Textile-stub