Latest posts
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Bharata Walked 14 Years Without the Crown: The Sandals That Ruled Ayodhya
The most unusual ruler in the Ramayana never sat on a throne. For fourteen years, royal orders in Ayodhya were issued in the name of a pair of wooden sandals, and the man who carried them out lived in a village outside the city, wearing bark and sleeping on the ground. The Prince Who Came…
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The Day Duryodhana Went to Gloat at the Pandavas and Came Back in Chains
Imagine planning a victory parade through your cousins’ neighbourhood, and ending the day tied up in a stranger’s chariot while those same cousins are asked to come and save you. That is almost exactly what happened to Duryodhana in the thirteenth-year-less-one of the Pandavas’ exile, in an episode the Mahabharata calls the Ghoshayatra, the “cattle-station…
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The Fire Sacrifice Indrajit Never Finished, and the Uncle Who Led Lakshmana to It
The war for Lanka had already taken most of Ravana’s family. His brother Kumbhakarna was dead. His sons were dead. Only one warrior remained whom even Indra had failed to stop, and the entire monkey army feared him more than Ravana himself. That was Indrajit, the conqueror of Indra, and he was about to do…
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The Demon Who Ate a Cartload of Rice a Week, Until Bhima Ate It First
Nobody in the town of Ekachakra had been asked whether they wanted to feed a monster. They simply did it, every week, because the alternative was worse. Into this town, after escaping the burning house of lac, walked five young men and their mother, dressed as wandering Brahmins. The Pandavas had spent months hiding in…
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The Night Indrajit Bound Rama and Lakshmana in Snakes That Only Garuda Could Break
Rama and Lakshmana lay motionless on the battlefield of Lanka, bound from head to toe in living snakes. Arrows had turned into serpents in midair and wrapped around the two princes so tightly that they could not lift a hand. The vanara army stood frozen. And on Lanka’s walls, Ravana’s son Indrajit was already laughing.…
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The Iron Statue Dhritarashtra Crushed to Powder in a Grieving Father’s Embrace
The war was over. Duryodhana was dead, the hundred Kaurava brothers were dead, and the old blind king Dhritarashtra sat in Hastinapura with nothing left of his dynasty but grief. Then the messengers announced that the Pandavas were coming to pay their respects. And in the palace that morning, one man was quietly afraid, and…
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The Buffalo Demon’s Corpse That Made One Mountain Deadly for Vali
When Rama first met Sugriva, the exiled vanara prince was living on a single mountain, Rishyamukha, and never leaving it. His brother Vali, the most powerful monkey king who ever lived, wanted him dead. Vali could cross oceans before breakfast. He had once carried Ravana around the world tucked under his arm. So why was…
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The Sick Old Monkey Bhima Couldn’t Move Was His Own Brother
Bhima had killed Hidimba with his bare hands. He had torn the demon Baka apart and carried his whole family out of a burning house of lac. There was, as far as he knew, nothing on earth he could not lift. And then, on a mountain path in the Himalayas, he met a sick old…
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The Princess Who Followed Death Into the Forest and Talked Him Out of Her Husband
During their long exile in the forest, Yudhishthira asked the sage Markandeya a painful question. Had there ever been a woman as devoted, and as wronged by fate, as Draupadi? Markandeya answered with a story. It is one of the most famous in the Mahabharata, and it is not really about devotion at all. It…
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The Headless Giant With a Mouth in His Belly Who Sent Rama to Sugriva
Rama had just lost everything. Sita had been carried off by a demon he could not yet name. Jatayu, the old vulture king who tried to stop the abduction, had died in his arms. The brothers had cremated him and walked on south, into forests that grew darker and stranger with every day, with no…