Chapter 14 - An Account of Sagara

1-2. Janamejaya said:—Why was the powerful king Sagara born with poison? And why did he, worked up with anger, put down the religious practices of Shakas and other highly powerful Kshatriya clans as laid down by their respective orders. And why was he not injured by poison? Describe all this at length, O great ascetic.

3. Vaishampayana said:—O king, when Vahu grew addicted to vice, Haihaya, with Talajanghas and Shakas spoliated his territories.

4. Yavanas, Paradas, Kambhojas, Palhavas and Shakas—these five classes (of Mlechas) displayed their prowess for Haihaya.

5. Deprived of his kingdom, the king Vahu retired into a forest life. Followed by his wife he gave up his life there in great misery.

6. His wife of the Yadu race was (at that time) enciente and she followed her husband whose other wife had administered poison unto her before (her departure).

7. When she, making a funeral pyre for her husband in that forest, got upon it Aurva, born in the family of Bhrigu, out of compassion, prevented her.

8. In his hermitage she gave birth to the highly powerful and mighty-armed king Sagara together with poison.

9-11. Having performed all the rites consequent upon the birth of that high-souled (king) Aurva taught him the Vedas and then gave him at last the fiery weapon which even the immortals cannot withstand. Gifted with great strength he, by dint of the prowess of that weapon, in no time destroyed the Haihayas like unto enraged Rudra slaying the beasts. That foremost of the illustrious (kings) spread his own fame in the world.

12. Thereupon he made up his mind for extirpating the race of the Shakas, Kambhojas and Palhavas.

13. When about to be slain by the high-souled hero, they, seeking refuge with the intelligent Vasishtha, bowed unto him.

14. Seeing them arrived in proper time the highly effulgent Vasishtha promised them security and prevented Sagara.

15. Considering his own promise and the words of his preceptor Sagara violated their religious practices and made them change their dress.

16. Having made the Shakas shave half of their heads he dismissed them. He made the Yavanas and Kambhojas shave their entire head.

17. Paradas used to have their hairs dishevelled and Palhavas kept beards. They were prohibited from studying the Vedas, and offering oblation to fire by the high-souled (Sagara).

18-19. O my child, Shakas, Yavanas, Kambhojas, Paradas, Kolasapyas, Mahishas, Darvas, Cholas and Keralas were all Kshatriyas. O king, at the words of Vasishtha their religious practices were put down by the high-souled Sagara.

20-21. Having conquered the entire earth consisting of (the provinces of) Khasa, Tukhara, China, Madra, Kishkindhaka, Kountala, Banga, Shalva, Konkashaka and others, that king, who had put down other religious forms, entered upon the performance of Bajapeya sacrifice and let loose a horse.

22. The horse, while it was roaming near the bank of the south eastern ocean, was pilfered and made to enter into the earth.

23-24. Then the king had that portion of the country dug by his sons. When that mighty ocean was thus dug up they arrived at a place where the prime deity, the Patriarch Hari, the best of male beings, in the shape of Kapila, was sleeping.

25. O great king, when he awoke all the sons (of Sagara), with the exception of four, were all consumed by the fire coming out of his eyes.

36. O king, they were Varhaketu, Suketu, Dharmaratha and the heroic Pancajana—they perpetuated the race of Sagara.

27-28. The Omniscient Hari Narayana conferred on him many boons viz.—unending family, the eternal glory of the Ikshvaku family, the birth of the ocean as his son, eternal habitation in heaven, and the ascension into the eternal region of those of his sons who had been consumed by the fiery looks of Kapila.

29. Thereupon the ocean worshipped that king with Arghya, and for this it obtained the appellation of Sagara.

30. He obtained from the ocean that horse destined for the Asvamedha sacrifice.

31. The highly illustrious king performed a hundred horse sacrifices and we have heard that he had sixty thousand sons.