[Pramāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/) › [Studies](https://indike.org/pramana/ins) › [Reference works](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference) › [A Classical Dictionary of Hindu Mythology and Religion, Geography, History, and Literature](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.dowson-1879) › c5.1155 # A Classical Dictionary of Hindu Mythology and Religion, Geography, History, and Literature c5.1155 A Classical Dictionary of Hindu Mythology and Religion, Geography, History, and Literature c5.1155 - **Language:** English ### [c5.1155](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.dowson-1879.c5.1155) MĀRISHĀ. Daughter of the sage Kandu, and wife of the Prachetasas, but from the mode of her birth she is called “the nursling of the trees, and daughter of the wind and the moon.” She was mother of Daksha. Her mother was a celestial nymph named Pramlochā, who beguiled the sage Kandu from his devotions and lived with him for a long time. When the sage awoke from his voluptuous delusion, he drove her from his presence. “She, passing through the air, wiped the perspiration from her with the leaves of the trees,” and “the child she had conceived by the Rishi came forth from the pores of her skin in drops of perspiration. The trees received the living dews, and the winds collected them into one mass. Soma matured this by his rays, and gradually it increased in size till the exhalations that had rested on the tree-tops became the lovely girl named Mārishā.”—\*Vishnu Purāna\*. According to the same authority Mārishā had been in a former birth the childless widow of a king. Her devotion to Vishnu gained his favour, and he desired her to ask a boon. She bewailed her childless state, and prayed that in succeeding births she might have “honourable husbands and a son equal to a patriarch.” She received the promise that she should be of marvellous birth, should be very beautiful, and should have ten husbands of mighty prowess, and a son whose posterity should fill the universe. This legend is no doubt an addition of later date, invented to account for the marvellous origin of Mārishā. - [Previous: c5.1154](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.dowson-1879.c5.1154) - [Next: c5.1156](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.dowson-1879.c5.1156) - [Up: c5](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.dowson-1879.c5) ## Cites (1) - [Viṣṇupurāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/in.purana.visnu) — Vyāsa, Sanskrit --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.dowson-1879.c5.1155](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.reference.dowson-1879.c5.1155) · Pramāṇa