Pandavas
- Also spelled:
- Pāṇḍavas
Who are the Pandavas?
What are the names of the Pandavas?
What happened during Draupadi’s swayamvara?
What happened to the Pandavas after the war?
Pandavas, in Hindu legend, the five sons of the dynastic hero Pandu. They defeated the Kauravas, their cousins, in the great war central to the Sanskrit epic poem the Mahabharata.
Birth and early years
The parentage of the Pandavas is nominally attributed to Pandu (from whose name the word Pandava is derived) and his queens, Kunti and Madri. Pandu, monarch of the kingdom of Kuru, had inadvertently interrupted the sage Kindama’s sexual congress with his wife. The sage cursed Pandu, leaving him unable to engage in sexual union. Pandu renounces the kingship and retires to the forest with his wives, leaving his elder brother Dhritarashtra to rule. During this voluntary exile, Pandu asks Kunti to use a mantra she had been granted, by which she could summon a deva (male deity in Hinduism) of her choice for the purpose of procreation. At Pandu’s request, Kunti shares the mantra with Madri. Five sons are then born (three to Kunti and two to Madri), who are collectively known as the Pandavas. In order of age, they are:
- Bhima: son of Kunti and Vayu (the god of wind); known for his superhuman strength and by the epithet Vrikodara (“Wolf Belly”) because of his voracious appetite.
- Arjuna: son of Kunti and Indra (god of rain and thunder and king of the devas); known for his skill in archery and by several epithets, among them Savyasachi (“Ambidextrous Archer”) and Dhananjaya (“Conqueror of Wealth”).
- Nakula and Sahadeva: twin sons of Madri and the Ashvins (twin deities of medicine); known for their wisdom and loyalty.
Before marrying Pandu Kunti received a mantra from the sage Durvasa that allowed her to summon any deva to sire a child. Kunti put this to the test by invoking the sun god Surya, and the result is a son named Karna, who was born with armor and earrings that made him invincible. Fearing the loss of her reputation, the unmarried Kunti set Karna adrift on a river. He was found and raised by a charioteer and grew up to be an archer of equal skill to Arjuna, if not greater. Despite his royal lineage, he was assigned the caste (Suta) of his foster father. Scorned as low-born by his younger half brothers and Draupadi, Karna allies with the Kauravas.
After the deaths of Pandu and Madri during exile, Kunti and the five brothers return to Hastinapura, the capital of Kuru. The Pandavas are raised alongside the 100 sons of Dhritarashtra, known collectively as the Kauravas. They too were born from a boon granted to Dhritarashtra’s queen Gandhari. She gave birth to a lump of flesh, which was divided into 101 portions and incubated in pots of ghee. Eventually, these transformed into 100 sons and a daughter. Unlike the Pandavas, who were of divine origin, the Kauravas were incarnations of demons. The cousins—the Pandavas, led by Yudhishthira, and the Kauravas, led by the eldest brother Duryodhana—become fierce rivals.
The house of lac
Dhritarashtra reluctantly appoints Yudhishthira as the crown prince, enraging his own sons. Duryodhana invites the Pandavas to spend a night in a specially commissioned mansion. However, the Pandavas discover that the structure is built of flammable lac and is intended to cause their deaths. When the house is set ablaze, the five brothers and Kunti escape by way of a secret tunnel and spend the next few years in self-imposed exile, disguised as Brahmins.
Draupadi’s swayamvara
- Prativindhya: son of Yudhishthira
- Sutasoma: son of Bhima
- Shrutakarma: son of Arjuna
- Shatanika: son of Nakula
- Shrutasena: son of Sahadeva
During this period the Pandavas enter a swayamvara, an ancient matrimonial tradition that allowed the bride to select a husband from participating suitors. To win the hand of Draupadi (also called Panchali, Krishnaa, and Yajnaseni), the princess of the Panchala kingdom, suitors must perform a complicated feat of archery: string a mighty bow and shoot an arrow through a fish-shaped target suspended over a pool of water by looking at its reflection. Arjuna succeeds in the task, and Draupadi becomes his bride. However, a misunderstanding occurs when the brothers return to Kunti. Arjuna and Bhima tell her in jest that they have brought her alms, referring to Draupadi. Without looking, Kunti instructs that the alms be shared equally between the brothers. On discovery of the truth—that the brothers were referring to Arjuna’s new bride—Kunti becomes distressed by her command but insists that she cannot take it back. She asks Yudhishthira to provide a solution that will prevent her words from being an untruth and ensure that Draupadi remains without sin. Arjuna renounces his sole claim to Draupadi, and by Yudhishthira’s decision she becomes the wife of all five Pandavas.
Other wives and children
In addition to their polyandrous marriage to Draupadi, the Pandavas marry other women:
- Yudhishthira marries Devika, a princess of the Sivi or Saiviya kingdom; their son is Yaudheya.
- Bhima marries Hidimbi, a rakshasi (demoness), and Valandhara, a princess of the Kashi kingdom. Their sons are, respectively, the half-demon Ghatotkacha and Savarga.
- Nakula marries the Chedi princess Karenumati, and their son is Niramitra.
- Sahadeva marries Vijaya, a princess of the kingdom of Madra—to which his mother Madri belonged; their son is Suhotra.
The game of dice
The Pandavas eventually return to Hastinapura, where Dhritarashtra divides the kingdom between the two factions. The Kauravas retain Hastinapura, and the Pandavas receive a barren tract, which they transform into a great city named Indraprastha. Duryodhana attends a rajasuya yajna (a ritual to establish kingship) conducted by Yudhishthira at a grand palace. Failing to distinguish a water feature from the glass floor of the palace, Duryodhana slips and falls into the water. Enraged, he plots afresh against the Pandavas. The result is a disastrous game of dice between Yudhishthira and the Kauravas’ maternal uncle Shakuni, who owns a pair of dice made of bones. The dice roll as Shakuni wishes, and Yudhishthira suffers an inglorious defeat, sinking further into ignominy with each loss—first, his wealth and kingdom; next, his brothers and himself; and last, Draupadi.
Dushasana, the second eldest Kaurava, drags a furiously protesting Draupadi to court, where he attempts to disrobe her in front of the assembled male audience. When her husbands fail to intervene, she prays to Krishna for protection. He extends the length of her garment infinitely, forcing Dushasana to eventually abandon the endless task of undraping Draupadi’s sari.
Exile
After the game of dice, the Pandavas and Draupadi are exiled for 12 years. They are also subjected to the condition of spending the 13th year in disguise. If discovered, they must spend a further 12 years in exile. They spend the 13th year in the court of King Virata under various assumed identities—a dice player named Kanka who would advise the king (Yudhishthira), a cook named Vallabha (Bhima), a eunuch and dance instructor named Brihannala (Arjuna), a stableman and a herdsman named Granthika and Tantripala (Nakula and Sahadeva), and a serving girl named Sairandhri (Draupadi; pseudonym also spelled Sairindhri). They reveal themselves at the end of the 13th year, but Duryodhana refuses them permission to return to Indraprastha.
The Kurukshetra war
Bheema’s son Ghatotkacha and Arjuna’s son Abhimanyu play heroic roles in the great war. The half-demon Ghatotkacha is a formidable warrior who decimates the Kaurava forces. He is ultimately defeated by a supernatural weapon wielded by Karna. The valiant Abhimanyu engages several great warriors, including Bhishma. He penetrates Drona’s complex chakravyuha (a multilayered circular military formation) but is isolated within it and is eventually slain by the combined assault of six Kaurava fighters, among them Karna.
The feud between the cousins concludes with a war fought over 18 days in Kurukshetra. Krishna enters the battle as Arjuna’s charioteer and counselor. In the Bhagavad Gita section of the sixth book of the Mahabharata, Arjuna suffers a crisis when he sees his granduncle Bhishma, instructor Drona, and several other relatives and friends among the Kaurava ranks, and Krishna delivers a sermon on a warrior’s obligation to fight for a just cause.
For a discussion of the dialogue between Arjuna and Krishna, see Bhagavad Gita.
Great feats of bravery take place in the course of the war. Both sides also adopt several dishonorable tactics. Yudhishthira infamously pronounces the death of Ashvatthama (a war elephant), deliberately implying that he is referring to Drona’s son, who bears the same name. The equivocation demoralizes Drona, who lays down his weapons. While he is disarmed, he is beheaded by Draupadi’s brother Drishtadyumna. Arjuna strikes down Karna while he is occupied in digging out his mired chariot wheel. Bhima strikes down Duryodhana by breaking his thighs, an act which is regarded as unlawful (the rules of mace fighting prohibit blows below the waist). The war ends with the annihilation of the Kauravas and the decimation of the Pandava allies by Ashvatthama, who invokes the Brahmastra (a powerful celestial weapon). The only Pandava descendant to survive is Abhimanyu’s unborn son Parikshit, who is targeted in his mother Uttara’s womb by Ashvatthama’s weapon and dies but is revived by Krishna.
Deaths
After ruling Indraprastha for some years, the brothers renounce worldly life and set out for the Himalayas and Mount Meru with Draupadi. On their way to the abode of the gods, most of the company fall by the wayside, suffering the consequences of their moral failings—Draupadi is undone by her preference for Arjuna, Sahadeva and Nakula are guilty of vanity, Arjuna is punished for pride in his martial prowess, and Bhima for the sin of gluttony. Yudhishthira survives, as does a dog that had been following the Pandavas on their final journey. When Indra comes in his chariot to take Yudhisthira to heaven, the eldest Pandava refuses to go without the dog and defends the animal’s devotion, after which the dog is revealed to be Dharma, Yudhishthira’s divine father. He takes Yudhishthira to heaven, where the Pandava encounters Duryodhana. Distressed, Yudhishthira demands to see his brothers and Draupadi and is told that they are in the underworld. He renounces his place in heaven and descends to hell. There he sees his brothers and Draupadi undergoing great suffering. However, this turns out to be a test, and the Pandavas and Draupadi are eventually reunited in heaven.