Object Number: VRM11320

Dimensions: 60.0 cm length; Waist 31cm

Material: Velvet, with silver and gold embroidery

Find Location: Bagha, Rajshahi District, Bangladesh

Date: 20th Century CE

This red velvet dress is sumptuously embroidered with floral designs in silver and gold thread. Many of these intricate motifs are enhanced with small mirrors, furthering its visual splendour and making the dress shimmer when light touches it. This spectacular dress was created for a life-changing event – marriage. Within South Asia, red is a colour associated with fertility, wealth and marital bliss and is often chosen as a colour for wedding dresses. This particular wedding dress belonged to the late Begum Zebunnesa.

Zebunnesa was the daughter-in-law of one of the zamindars belonging to the Mahipur Alam estate in Rangpur. Zamindars were local feudal rulers of the region from the 18th Century CE onwards, and were politically influential, as well as wealthy. Tailored from expensive materials, this dress is a visual and physical representation of the riches, power and influence of Zamindari families.

However, the dress is very small, which suggests that it was made for a child. In the early 20th Century, child brides were a cultural norm and the arrangement of marriages was also an extension of Zamindar authority over land and family. The path towards outlawing this practice began with the Child Marriage Restraint Act of 1929, which set the minimum age of marriage at 18 for girls and 21 for boys.