Uttaṅka (Paushya)

Classical

The very first tale in the Adi Parva frame is a heist in the underworld.

Before the Mahabharata gets to its war, it tells a number of stories that look sideways at the main plot. This is one of them: the tale of Uttanka and the queen's earrings, and it ends up at the door of the snake sacrifice that King Janamejaya will hold.

Uttanka is the pupil of a teacher named Veda, himself a student of the sage Ayoda-Dhaumya. Veda is a kind teacher, because he remembers how hard his own schooling was and never works his pupils to the bone. When he has to travel to perform a sacrifice, he leaves Uttanka in charge of the house. In his absence the teacher's wife comes to Uttanka and asks him to give her a child, since this is the right time for it. Uttanka refuses flatly: he will not do a wrong thing because a woman tells him to. When Veda comes home he is delighted with his pupil's conduct and lets him go home.

But Uttanka insists on paying a fee first. Veda tells him to ask his wife what she wants, and she asks for the earrings worn by Queen Paushya, because in four days there is a sacred day when she wants to appear wearing them. So Uttanka sets out.

On the road he meets a huge bull with a very tall man sitting on it. The man tells him to eat the bull's dung. Uttanka hesitates, then does it, rinses properly, and goes on to King Paushya. The king sends him to the women's rooms, but he cannot find the queen. Paushya says it must be because Uttanka is unclean from what he ate. Uttanka purifies himself with care, and now he finds the queen, who gives him the earrings. She warns him that Takshaka, king of the snakes, wants them badly.

Then comes a ritual meal, and a quarrel. Uttanka finds the food cold, with a hair in it, and says so. Paushya, stung, curses him with blindness. Uttanka curses Paushya with childlessness. They part with the earrings in Uttanka's hands.

The warning was right. As Uttanka bathes, a naked beggar snatches the earrings and runs. Uttanka chases him down, but the beggar turns out to be Takshaka, who slips down a hole into the snake world. Uttanka tries to dig after him with a stick. Indra sends his thunderbolt to widen the hole, and Uttanka goes down into the serpent realm. His praises of the snakes bring no result. Then he sees two women weaving at a loom, a wheel being turned by boys, and a man beside a horse, and he praises these too. The man tells him to blow into the horse. When he does, fire pours out, and a frightened Takshaka gives back the earrings.

There is just one problem: the sacred day is almost here and Uttanka is a long way off. The man with the horse offers to carry him, and Uttanka arrives in time. The teacher's wife is pleased and does not curse him.

Veda then explains what he saw. The weaving women are Dhata and Vidhata, and the threads are night and day. The wheel is the year. The man is Parjanya, the horse is Agni, and the bull is Airavata with Indra on his back. The dung he ate was amrita, the drink of immortality, which kept him safe in the world of the snakes.

Now the story turns to what Uttanka really wants: revenge on Takshaka. He goes to Hastinapura, where Janamejaya has just come back from Takshashila, and urges him to take revenge for the death of his father Parikshit by holding a snake sacrifice. Janamejaya is furious, and when Uttanka tells him the full story of how his father died, the king is overcome with grief. That is how a story about a pair of earrings sets up one of the Mahabharata's great frames.

Told by Ugraśravas → ṛṣis

Who: Agni, Indra, Takshaka, Uttanka, Veda

Bound to

Jaratkāru & Āstika origin

Uttaṅka same-story-other-version

Uttanka urges the snake sacrifice causes

Uttanka's anger at Krishna and the thirst boon trivia-about

Places: Naga-loka

Where this comes from

CE · Mahabharata, Critical Edition 1.3 1.3
read for this telling · Mahabharata, Ganguli translation (mahabharataonline.com) Adi Parva, Paushya Parva, Section III (Uttanka episode)

Another telling

Uttanka asks his teacher Veda what he owes. Veda's wife, still resentful that Uttanka refused her, demands the earrings of King Pushya's queen within three days. Takshaka steals them while Uttanka bathes; with Indra's Vajra Uttanka tunnels to the serpent world, sees weavers and a twelve-spoked wheel, and fire summoned through Agni forces Takshaka to return them. Veda later explains the symbols as time and creation.

vulgate (Ganguli) · Ganguli translation of the Mahabharata (read via MahabharataOnline) Ganguli, Adi Parva, Section III (Paushya Parva)
commentary · Wikipedia: Uttanka Adi Parva (frame story)

See it on the tree · All stories

← Ruru & Pramadvarā · Khāṇḍava-daha →