Devalok
Local story · 1 telling · West India

The cow at Khatu (how the head came to Khatu)

Long after the war a cow at Khatu begins to pour her milk onto one spot of ground. The villagers dig and find a head. The ruler of Khatu is told in a dream to build a temple for it, and the head is installed on the eleventh of the bright half of Kartika, which is kept as Shyam's birthday. The pool where it was found is the Shyam Kund.

Who is in it

Places: Khatu

The story, beat by beat

  1. A cow at Khatu pours her milk on one spot every day.
  2. The villagers dig and find the head, which a Brahmin keeps and worships.
  3. Roop Singh Chauhan, or his queen Narmada Kanwar, is told in a dream to build a temple.
  4. The head is installed on Kartika shukla ekadashi; the pool becomes the Shyam Kund.
  5. The temple is rebuilt in 1720 by Diwan Abhay Singh for the ruler of Marwar.

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How it is told, place by place

Base telling · Temple tradition

As the temple of Khatu tells it

West India · hi Folk 🪔 Khatu Shyam Phalgun Mela

A cow at Khatu begins pouring her milk on one spot of ground. The people dig and find a head, which a Brahmin keeps and worships. Roop Singh Chauhan, ruler of Khatu, or his queen Narmada Kanwar, dreams that it is the head of Barbarika and is told to build a temple. The temple is raised in 1027 and the head installed on the eleventh of the bright half of Kartika. The pool where it was found is the Shyam Kund. The temple is rebuilt in 1720 by Diwan Abhay Singh.

Khatu Shyamji, Devasthan Vibhag, Government of Rajasthan; Khatu Shyam katha and Khatu pragatya (khatu.in)

Sources: Khatu Shyamji, Devasthan Vibhag, Government of Rajasthan; Khatu Shyam katha and Khatu pragatya (khatu.in)

More stories with the same people

Legend

The riddle on the swing (Ghatotkacha's bride and Barbarika's birth)

Krishna proposes Kamakantakata, Mura's daughter, as Ghatotkacha's bride; he wins her in Pragjyotisha with a riddle and in battle, she carries him to Indraprastha, and their son is born grown, named Barbarika for his hair and Suhridaya by Krishna. Khatu gives the boy a mother called Morvi or the Naga princess Ahilavati, who teaches him war, and has Shiva give the three arrows and Agni the bow.
Legend

The guard at Vijaya's fire

Told by the goddesses to help the Brahmin Vijaya, Barbarika guards his night-long rite at Guptakshetra against a demoness, a mountain and the demon Repalendra, the she-mule Duhadruha and a disguised demon he follows down to the city of Bahuprabha. The Nagas grant Vijaya success, and Vijaya gives Barbarika the ash of his fire.
Legend

The grandson at the pond

The exiled Pandavas reach the shrine of Chandika at Guptakshetra; Bhima washes in the goddess's pond, its guardian Barbarika forbids it, and they fight without knowing each other. Barbarika is about to throw Bhima into the sea when Rudra's voice names him his grandfather; in remorse he leaps into the sea and the goddesses save him.
Legend

Bhima's blindness and Yogamaya's promise

After the fight at the pond Yudhishthira praises Durga; Bhima says the Pandavas should worship Krishna or Shiva, not a goddess, and goes blind until both worship her and she appears as Yogamaya, promising help in the war.
From the epics

The head that watched the war (Barbarika and Krishna)

Barbarika, Bhima's grandson, comes to Kurukshetra with three arrows that never miss, sworn to fight for whichever side is losing. Krishna, seeing that this would leave no one alive, comes as a Brahmin and asks for his head, and Barbarika gives it. The head watches the war from a hill and is given Krishna's name, Shyam. The Skanda Purana tells it differently, with Krishna's discus and an old curse.