Devalok
God · All traditions · Pan-India

Prithvi

Also called: Prithivi, Bhumi, Bhudevi, Vasundhara, Vasumati, Dharani

Mother Earth, the broad one. In the Rigveda she is praised with Dyaus as the Mother in six hymns and alone in one of three verses (5.84); a funeral verse sends the dead to her lap (10.18.10). The Atharvaveda's Earth hymn (12.1) praises her in sixty-three verses, calls the speaker her son and Parjanya her husband. Later she is Bhumi or Bhudevi: the cow King Prithu milks, the goddess Varaha raises, the consort of Vishnu, and the Earth who rests three days a year in Odisha, Assam and Tulu Nadu.

Sources: Hymns of the Rigveda, tr. R. T. H. Griffith (1896), hymns read for the Vedic layer; Hymns of the Atharva-Veda, tr. R. T. H. Griffith (1895); The Veda of the Black Yajus School (Taittiriya Sanhita), tr. A. B. Keith (1914); The Vishnu Purana, tr. H. H. Wilson (1840); Vedic Mythology, A. A. Macdonell (1897) · see Prithvi's web

Relations 7

Prithvi consort of

  • Dyaus (God)
    Heaven is the father and Earth the mother; the Aitareya Brahmana (4.27) tells of their marriage.
  • Parjanya (God)
    The Earth is by implication Parjanya's wife (RV 5.83.4); Atharvaveda 12.1.12 says Earth is the mother and Parjanya the father. Elsewhere the Atharvaveda names his wife as Vasha.

Prithvi parent of

  • Agni (God)
    Agni is often called the son of Heaven and Earth (RV 3.2.2, 3.25.1, 10.1.2).
  • Brihaspati (God)
    Heaven and Earth are the parents of Brihaspati (RV 7.97.8).

Prithvi blessed by

  • Prithu (King) · Prithu milks the Earth
    Prithu spares the Earth's life and is counted her father; she is named Prithivi after him (Vishnu Purana).

Prithvi emanates from

Prithvi has form

  • Aditi (God)
    Aditi is often identified with the Earth in the Taittiriya Samhita and Shatapatha Brahmana, and the Naighantuka lists her name as a word for earth. Many Rigveda verses name her apart from Heaven and Earth.

Stories 9

Cited