Stories 5
All kinds
Origin
Legend
Local story
Folk tale
From the epics
Festival story
Temple legend
In stone and bronze
How a tradition frames it
Everywhere
Pan-India 95
South India 67
West India 30
East India 22
North India 15
The Himalaya 12
Northeast India 5
Southeast Asia 4
Central India 4
✕ sacrifice
devotionbooncreationdisguisesupremacycursemarriagepenancepridetestdancepilgrimagebirthemanationfirebeheadingdemon slayingdesireiconographyausteritychurningcombined formcosmogonyhomecominglingapoisonrebirthriveratonement
Tradition: Shaiva · clear
Legend · 5 tellings · contested
Daksha's sacrifice and the death of Sati
At a gathering Shiva stays seated when Daksha enters; Daksha reads it as contempt.
Legend · 2 tellings · contested
Kannappa gives his eyes
Thinnan, a hunter chief, finds a linga on the Kalahasti hill and is seized by love for it.
Legend · 4 tellings · contested
Shiva drinks the poison
Gods and demons churn the ocean of milk for the nectar.
Legend · 3 tellings · contested
Two origins of the discus
The Sudarshana is either Shiva's gift at Kashi after Vishnu offers his own eye in place of a missing lotus, or Vishvakarma's work from the radiance shaved off the sun.
Legend · 3 tellings · contested
Vishnu's thousand lotuses and his eye
Vishnu pledges a thousand lotuses to Shiva at Kashi; finding one missing, he offers his own lotus-eye; Shiva restores the eye and gives him the Sudarshana discus. The day is kept as Vaikuntha Chaturdashi; a related Kashi charter has Vishnu's penance create Manikarnika.