An Index to the Names in the Mahabharata, with Short Explanations and a Concordance to the Bombay and Calcutta Editions and P. C. Roy's Translation c5.s6.297
An Index to the Names in the Mahābhārata, with Short Explanations and a Concordance to the Bombay and Calcutta Editions and P. C. Roy's Translation c5.s6.297
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- English
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[Jatugṛhaparvan] (“the section relating to the lac-house,” the 8th of the minor parvans of Mhbhr.). (Cf. Jatuveçmākhya[m parva].) § 213: Vaiçampāyana briefly related the plan of Saubala, Duryodhana, Duḥçāsana, Karṇa, and Dhṛtarāshṭra to burn the Pāṇḍavas and Kuntī in a lac-house, and their escape. Asked by Janamejaya, he then began to relate it more fully. The Pāṇḍavas frustrated all the plans of murdering them laid by Duryodhana, etc., without speaking of them, in obedience to the counsels of Vidura. People began to speak in all public places of installing Yudhishṭhira on the throne instead of Dhṛtarāṣṭra. Duryodhana represented to Dhṛtarāṣṭra that this would for ever exclude himself and his brothers from the throne (I, 141). Duryodhana, Karṇa, Śakuni, and Duḥśāsana held a consultation together, and Duryodhana prevailed upon Dhṛtarāṣṭra to exile the Pāṇḍavas to Vāraṇāvata (“Aśvatthāman is on my side; with him follow Droṇa and Kṛpa; Vidura is dependent on us for its means of life, though he is covertly with the foe”) (I, 142). Duryodhana and his brothers began gradually to win over the people to their side by grants of wealth and honours, while Dhṛtarāṣṭra suggested to the Pāṇḍavas to visit the festival of Paśupati at Vāraṇāvata.
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Fully understanding the motives of Dhṛtarāṣṭra, Yudhiṣṭhira let Bhīṣma, Vidura, Droṇa, Bāhlīka, Somadatta, Kṛpa, Aśvatthāman, Bhūriśravas, Gāndhārī, etc., give them their benedictions, and the Pāṇḍavas having performed propitiatory rites in order to obtain the kingdom, set out for Vāraṇāvata (I, 143). Duryodhana prevailed upon Purocana to reach Vāraṇāvata that very day upon a swift chariot, and to construct a house of inflammable materials and burn the Pāṇḍavas and Kuntī (I, 144). The people, who were distressed by the departure of the Pāṇḍavas, and angry with Dhṛtarāṣṭra, were calmed by Yudhiṣṭhira. Vidura, in obscure words (cf. Mlecchavācā, v. 5803), warned Yudhiṣṭhira, who explained the meaning to Kuntī. They set out on the 8th day of the month of Phālguna when Rohiṇī was ascendant (I, 145). They were received with great honours by the citizens of Vāraṇāvata and installed by Purocana first in a palace that had been built for them, and after ten days in the lac-house called Śiva (Śivākhyam). Yudhiṣṭhira scented the smell of fat, etc., and told it to Bhīma, but resolved to seem unsuspicious (I, 146). A miner, sent by Vidura, told Yudhiṣṭhira that Purocana would put fire to the house on the fourteenth night of the dark lunation, and made a large subterranean passage (I, 147). They lived there for a year. Then on a certain night Kuntī fed a large number of brahmans;
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and there came also a Niṣāda woman with her five sons, who became intoxicated and lay down in the house to sleep. The Pāṇḍavas then set fire to the house and burnt Purocana and the Niṣādas, while they themselves escaped through the subterranean passage and fled in haste, Bhīma carrying his mother and brothers (cf. III, v. 546 foll.). The citizens thought they had been burnt to death (I, 148). A person sent by Vidura took the Pāṇḍavas and Kuntī to the other side of the Gaṅgā in a boat (I, 149). The miner had covered the hole he had dug with ashes, and the towns-people thought that the Niṣāda woman with her five sons were Kuntī and the Pāṇḍavas, and sent to Dhṛtarāṣṭra to inform him that they had been burnt to death together with Purocana. Dhṛtarāṣṭra wept in deep sorrow, and caused the funeral rites to be performed. Meanwhile the Pāṇḍavas having crossed the Gaṅgā proceeded in the darkness to the south and reached a dense forest. Yudhiṣṭhira then prevailed upon Bhīma to carry Kuntī and his brothers (I, 150). The motion of Bhīma’s legs raised a wind like that of the months of Cuci and Cukra, while he trod down the trees and swam across streams. Towards evening they sat down in a terrible forest under a banyan-tree. Kuntī was thirsty, and Bhīma proceeded to a pool at a distance of a gavyūti, and brought water by soaking his upper garments.
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When he found them sleeping from fatigue, he lamented that Yudhiṣṭhira would not yet allow him to slay Duryodhana, etc., and sat there awake keeping watch over them (I, 151).