Puranic Encyclopaedia: A Comprehensive Dictionary with Special Reference to the Epic and Puranic Literature c7.1223

c7.1223

6) Reṇukā was killed. Paraśurāma became fourteen years old. Jamadagni went to the forest to gather fruits, roots etc. After completing the cleansing work of the hermitage, leaving Paraśurāma in the forest, Reṇukā went to the bank of the river Narmadā (Revā) to fetch water. When she reached the river, Kārtavīryārjuna and his wives were playing in water. She waited for them to go. When they were gone she got into the river. But as the water was muddy because of the play, she walked a little to the east where there was pure water. She saw there Citraratha the King of Sālva playing with his wife in the water. How beautiful they were! She had never seen so beautiful a woman or so handsome a man. She stood there looking at them for a while. When she reached the hermitage with water, Jamadagni had already returned a long while ago. He had returned weary and tired of the heat of the midday-sun. He did not see his wife in the hermitage. He had been sitting very angry when Reṇukā returned with water. She put the pot down and bowed before her husband and told him the reason for her being late. When he heard the reason his anger blazed. He called his sons one by one and ordered them to kill her. But the four elder sons did not dare to execute his order saying that slaughter of a woman was a great sin. But Paraśurāma came forward and by a cutting-arrow cut off the head of his mother. The father called the four sons who disobeyed him and cursed them thus :