Posted on: 8 July 2012

King Shantanu proposes to a low caste fisher girl, Matsyagandha.

Chromolithograph by: Ravi Varma
Published: A.K. Joshi & Co.Bombay (182 Kalbadevi Road) Printed: Ravi Varma Press,Karli, Bombay
Credit: Wellcome Library, London

Satyavati (Sanskrit: सत्यवती, Satyavatī) (also spelled Satyawati), or Setyawati (Indonesian) was the queen of the Kuru king Shantanu of Hastinapur and the great-grandmother of the Pandava and Kaurava princes (principal characters of the Mahabharata, one of the principal texts in Hindu mythology). She is also the mother of the seer Vyasa, author of the epic. Her story appears in the Mahabharata, the Harivamsa and the Devi Bhagavata Purana.

Daughter of the Chedi king Vasu (also known as Uparichara Vasu) and a cursed apsara (celestial nymph)-turned-fish Adrika, Satyavati was brought up as a commoner – the adopted daughter of a fisherman-chieftain (who was also a ferryman) on the banks of the river Yamuna. Due to the smell emanating from her body she was known as Matsyagandha ("She who has the smell of fish"), and helped her father in his job as a ferryman.

As a young woman Satyavati met the wandering rishi (sage) Parashara, who fathered her son Vyasa out of wedlock. The sage also gave her a musky fragrance, which earned her names like Yojanagandha ("She whose fragrance is spread for a yojana (8-9 miles)") and Gandhavati ("fragrant one").

Later King Shantanu, captivated by her fragrance and beauty, fell in love with Satyavati and asked her to marry him. She married Santanu on condition that their children inherit the throne, denying the birthright of Santanu's eldest son (and crown prince) Bhishma. Satyavati bore Shantanu two children, Chitrangada and Vichitravirya. After Shantanu's death, she and her princely sons ruled the kingdom. Although both her sons died childless, she arranged for her first son Vyasa to father the children of the two widows of Vichitravirya through niyoga. The children (Dhritarashtra and Pandu) became fathers of the Kauravas and Pandavas, respectively. After Pandu's death, Satyavati went to the forest for penance and died there.

While Satyavati's presence of mind, far-sightedness and mastery of realpolitik is praised, her unscrupulous means of achieving her goals and her blind ambition are criticized.

- Wiki


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There seems to be so many stories involving regal men and low caste women in Hindu epics, pretty sure the Srimad Devi Bhagavatam is full of them...

so natural

likes this

Beautiful Ravi Verma Painting work..Photo is as romantic as Mahabharat story..

Sri Aurobindo in the Renaissance in India "...the preposterous Ravi Varma interlude which was doomed to sterility by its absurdly barren incompetence..." This painting shows indeed pathetically preposterous and absurd incompetence in terms of artistic sense!

So British..??? what kind of drugs are you taking mate..

... Re: 'So British ' Ha ha... well, you wouldn't get away with boating in that state of undress on the Serpentine in Hyde Park !... and there is a certain, er, ' psychedelic ' quality to this image I must say... saucy sailors ahoy ! ...

Raja Ravi Verma is one of the Indian colonial painters whose works also came to be known as 'Calender Art'. They were the very first ones to copy the European techniques of 'oil on canvas' but chosen the same old themes of Indian mythology, thus produced art of a hybrid nature but with a bad taste. They can be considered as influenced from British, since the British were the first to introduce the European style of painting in India during the colonial period.

'low caste fisher-girl' may be a later interpretation. Matsya was the name of a country.

I hv seen better paintings done by Ravi Verma.

The fisherman's daughter's name was Satyavati

her name was satyavati........they were calling 'mastya-gandha' just bcoz ..she was having fragrance of fish.....

Here is a fine example of WARDROBE MALFUNCTION ....

Very beautiful! Just finished translating the latest Anita Nair's novel, where Varma's paintings have an important role.

Proposes should more properly read seduces.

just Beautiful and immortal

Dare he would have painted a 'Low Caste' man proposing to a Brahmin or Ruling class girl with a breast exposed !

can't find it on google images ... but wikipedia has a different painting by Raja Ravi Varma of Shantanu & Satyavati (Matsyagandha): http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f6/Ravi_Varma-Shantanu_and_Satyavati.jpg/250px-Ravi_Varma-Shantanu_and_Satyavati.jpg

King Shantanu marries a low caste fisher girl, Satyavati. Satyavati’s mendicant son, Vyasa, fathers the mighty Kshatriyas, Dhritarashtra and Pandu, fathers of the Kauravas and Pandavas, rulers of the mightiest kingdoms of the subcontinent. And all this through the brilliant mind of the author Vyasa… this reveals the foibles of humans and the depth of Indian philosophy and civilization. It is the genius of 19th century British writing that a mindboggling hierarchy of “castes” were documented and frozen as a timeless ordering of “Indian natives,” through the widely cited British Raj Censuses of 1870-1930, while giving them the patina of authority through the monumental works of the “Imperial Gazetteers of India.” The irony is that the elite in modern India liked it and became it in spite of the Republic of India’s Constitution and the many laws banning this oppressive propaganda… It’s also Sunday morning in Florida, one of the few states in the US that is not in suffering from drought.

like this.

nice

King Shantanu's life and the greatest epic Mahabharata is a source of knowledge and reference for all Hindus and we live by those principles. Raja Ravi Varma was a great artist but I don't have much to say about this painting. But British Raj and their and their censuses I don't know BOSS...

beautiful.

everybody would like to ride in this board

King ki najar me sab barabar hote h bhaiya.....

she needs to cover up and he should be rowing and the poor horse :-)

//unscrupulous means of achieving her goals and her blind ambition// How prejudiced can we get even in Wiki... In the whole of Mahabaharatha one of the most unexplored inner world belongs to Satyavati. She is so feminine and huamnistic. She understands the women around her and manipulates the male ego for what it deserves. After all She is the mother of Veda Vyasa - pranams at Her feet the Fisher Woman whose son gave us the Vedas and thus culturally united this nation.. We are a nation born of a fisher-woman. Though a colonial minded perspective may deem her as 'lower caste', here is a fisher-woman and to wed her the king himself has to enter into compromises with the clan-leader of fisher-folks. This also shows that the kings in India (unlike in Europe) never had unlimited powers. This pattern is not just mythical. Epigraphic evidence shows that Indic kings (not Mughals) always had their powers tempered by community leaders. The system was quasi-democratic and dynamic.

Colours are so charming, really beautiful.