“The Widow” and “Her Dying Words” are two notable examples of yadam that dealt with problems relating to social conventions. Understanding these works requires an awareness of the marital customs of the aristocracy, particularly the proscription against the remarriage of a widow. The conventional wisdom was that “a good wife does not serve two husbands.” As a result, young widows of the noble class were expected as a matter of course to live out the rest of their lives without a new spouse. The constraints were not imposed in the form of any law prohibiting widows of noble birth from meeting someone new and remarrying. However, any son born of those remarried widows was deemed deficient in his claims to nobility and subject to considerable discrimination when he sought appointment to a government office or promotion.
