About
Anjanavati — Celestial Female Elephant, Consort of Supratika
Anjanavati · Anjanavatii
Anjanavati is the eighth and last of the female celestial elephants who are the consorts and siblings of the Ashtadiggajas. She is a daughter of Iravati, who is the daughter of Bhadramada, one of the ten daughters of Krodhavarsha, a wife of Kashyapa the great progenitor sage. Anjanavati is paired with Supratika, the eighth of the eight male Ashtadiggajas and guardian of the north-eastern direction. She is named in enumerations of the dik-gaja consorts in the Matanga-Lila. No individual narrative episodes are recorded for Anjanavati in the primary sources beyond her identity, lineage, and pairing.
✦ The Name
Anjanavati is a compound formed from anjana, meaning collyrium or dark eye-salve, and the suffix vati, meaning one who possesses or is characterised by, yielding the sense of she who possesses the quality of anjana or she of the dark or collyrium-like appearance. The name thus parallels the name of her consort's sibling Anjana, the male dik-gaja of the west, whose name shares the same root. Applied to this female elephant, it may indicate a dark or dusky colouring. The name also echoes the name of Anjana, the mother of Hanuman in the Ramayana tradition, though that figure is entirely distinct and shares only the root name.
✦ Lineage
- Paternal great-grandfather: Kashyapa — the foremost progenitor sage
- Paternal great-grandmother: Krodhavarsha — daughter of Daksha, wife of Kashyapa
- Grandmother: Bhadramada — one of the ten daughters of Krodhavarsha
- Mother: Iravati — daughter of Bhadramada; mother of all sixteen dik-gaja elephants
- Siblings (female): Abhramu, Kapila, Pingala, Anupama, Tamrakarni, Shubhradanti, and Angana
- Siblings (male): Airavata, Pundarika, Vamana, Kumuda, Anjana, Pushpadanta, Sarvabhauma, and Supratika
- Consort: Supratika — the eighth of the eight male Ashtadiggajas, guardian of the north-eastern direction, who appears in the Mahabharata's Aranyaka Parva in a narrative of past-life fraternal conflict and rebirth
✦ References
- Primary Sources
- Matanga-Lila (attributed to Nilakantha): Names Anjanavati as the eighth of the eight female dik-gaja elephants and records her pairing with Supratika.
- Secondary Sources
- Mani, Vettam. Puranic Encyclopaedia. Motilal Banarsidass, 1975: Brief reference to Anjanavati in the context of the dik-gaja consort enumerations.