Devalok
Legend · 2 tellings · West India

The bride who came back too tall

King Raivata takes his daughter Revati to Brahma to ask whom she should marry; while he waits for the heavenly singers to finish, ages pass on earth; Brahma sends him back to give her to Balarama, and in the Vishnu Purana Balarama shortens the too-tall bride with his ploughshare.

Who is in it

Texts: Vishnu Purana, Bhagavata Purana

The story, beat by beat

  1. Raivata finds no prince worthy of his daughter and takes her to Brahma's world.
  2. He waits while Haha and Huhu sing before Brahma.
  3. Brahma tells him the ages have passed and his whole world is gone.
  4. Brahma sends him to Baladeva at Dwaraka, once Kusasthali.
  5. On earth men have dwindled; he gives her to Balarama.
  6. Balarama shortens her with his ploughshare and they marry; the king retires to the Himalaya.

time marriage the ages

How it is told, place by place

Base telling · Primary text (translation)

Vishnu Purana 4.1

West India · Kusasthali / Dwaraka Vaishnava

Revata rules Anarta from Kusasthali; his son Raivata, or Kakudmin, eldest of a hundred brothers, finds no one worthy of his lovely daughter and takes her to Brahma's world. The singers Haha and Huhu are performing, and he waits, taking the ages for a moment. Brahma, smiling, tells him the grandsons' grandsons of the princes he names are dead, the twenty-eighth great age of this Manu is nearly over, and all his people and wealth are gone. Brahma speaks of Vishnu who is time and sends him to Baladeva, a portion of Vishnu ruling at Dwaraka, once Kusasthali. On earth men have dwindled in size and strength. He gives her to Balarama, who, seeing her very tall, shortens her with the end of his ploughshare. They marry, and the king goes to the Himalaya.

Vishnu Purana 4.1, tr. H. H. Wilson (1840), sacred-texts (archived)

Primary text (translation)

Bhagavata Purana 9.3

West India Vaishnava

Revata builds Kushasthali in the depths of the sea. His son Kakudmi takes his daughter Revati to Brahmaloka, where Brahma is busy with the Gandharvas' music. When it ends Brahma laughs: twenty-seven rounds of the four ages have passed and the princes' lines are forgotten. He tells him to give her to Baladeva, still on earth. Kakudmi finds his city empty, his kin fled for fear of Yakshas, gives his daughter to Baladeva and goes to Badarikashrama.

What is different here:

No shortening with the plough; twenty-seven rounds of ages; the king goes to Badari.

Srimad Bhagavatam 9.3 (Bhaktivedanta Book Trust, vedabase)

Sources: Vishnu Purana 4.1, tr. H. H. Wilson (1840), sacred-texts (archived); Srimad Bhagavatam 9.3 (Bhaktivedanta Book Trust, vedabase)

More stories with the same people

How a tradition frames it

The bird and the lion

After killing Hiranyakashipu, Narasimha's fury will not cool; in the Shiva Purana Shiva becomes the winged beast Sharabha and lifts him away, while in the Bhagavata Lakshmi dares not approach and the boy Prahlada calms him with a bow.
From the epics

Sita walks into the fire

After the war Rama tells Sita before the assembly that he fought for his honour, not for her; she answers him and walks into a pyre, and Agni himself carries her out unburnt; later tellings say the woman in Lanka was only her shadow and the real Sita had waited in the fire.
Temple legend

The cow, the anthill and the cowherd's axe

Looking for Lakshmi, Vishnu sits in an anthill on the Venkata hill, and Brahma and Shiva come as a cow and calf to feed him. The Chola king's cowherd, finding the cow dry, follows her and swings his axe; the god rises from the anthill and takes the blow. The wound on his head is why the image wears camphor, and why pilgrims give their hair.
Legend

Shesha, the serpent who holds the earth

Shesha, eldest of the thousand naga brothers, leaves them for their envy and malice and does austerities until his body dries to sinew; Brahma asks him to hold the unsteady earth, and he goes below and bears it on his head; the epic's last books show him leaving the dying Balarama as a white serpent going home to the sea.
Legend

Durgama, the weeping eyes and the goddess of greens

The demon Durgama wins all the Vedas from Brahma; worship stops, rain stops, and a hundred years of drought follow. The goddess appears with countless eyes and weeps for nine days until the rivers fill, feeds the world from her own body as Shakambhari, then kills Durgama and takes his name: Durga.
Origin

The goddess from the fire

A demon made from Kama's ashes takes half the strength of any foe; the gods offer their bodies to a great fire, Lalita rises from the light, and she chooses Kameshvara with a garland.
Local story

Murugan teaches Shiva the meaning of Om

The boy Murugan asks Brahma what Om means, and when Brahma cannot say, locks him up; when Shiva comes to ask for his release, the son teaches the father, and at Swamimalai the boy's shrine stands on the hill above Shiva's.
Legend

The garland in the dust: Durvasa, Indra and the three worlds going grey

Durvasa gives Indra a garland that carries Shri's presence; Indra hangs it on his elephant, the elephant throws it down, and the sage's curse strips the three worlds of her. Only the churning of the ocean brings her back, and Indra's hymn wins her promise never to leave again.