________________
Secondary Tales of the two Great Eples
Dames of Tapati and Samvarana, Tapati being the second daughter of Sun, association of rains with the presence of Samvaraṇa, and the birth of the tiller-king - all these elements, point to a strong probability of a myth being imbibed in the tale.
It should be noted that the tale is introduced with the merest pretext of Arjuna being addressed as Tāpatya - "the descendant of Tapati". The address is the most unusual and unique in the entire MBh and is clearly intended to introduce the tale.
The episode of Arjuna's fight with the Gandharva may be considered a part of the principal tale, since here by becoming a friend of Arjuna, and later on in VanP by taking Duryodhana prisoner, he plays some part in the principal tale, and becomes a character in it.
Finally, we come to the episodes connected with the birth and the polyandrous marriage of Draupadi. "She is the central figure of the story...and every other figure derives importance from the relation in which he or she stands towards her, as friend, kin or enemy". 277 She is shown to be born, alongwith her brother Dhșstadyumna, from the sacrifice which Drupada performs in order to be able to avenge the insult which his brāhmio schoolfriend Droņa has inflicted upon him. But, she is shown to be married to the Pāņdavas, and "The Pāņdavas, it will be remembered, were Kaur. avas and had taken as active a part (Arjuna's, according to the Epic, was the most determinative) as their cousins in the transaction which gave occasion for the special creation of these instruments of revenge". 378 Could she, then, be married to the Pāņdavas ? Mr. Ghose, in his forceful language of a lawyer, makes out the case that Droņa. is entirely fictitious and is imposed upon the Epic from outside. "One fiction breeds a dozen others. The dressed-up defeat and humiliation of Drupada at the hands of his Brāhman adversary makes it a poetical necessity, on the part of the Brāhmaṇ author, to provide that Drupada in his turo should get (as a gift from Brāhmaṇs, of course) a son who will square his accounts for him with Drona, and a daughter destined in a parallel manner to bring death and destruction upon the House of Droņa's Kaurava allies. But to allow these children to be begotten on the body of Drupada's chaste consort would have so uoduly delayed the scheme of revenge (Droņa was getting on in years and the Pāņdavas had already attained marriageable age), that the miracle-working Brāhmaṇs cause them to come out of the materials of the very yajña through the magic efficacy of which all this was to be accomplished. So are born (Sūta-Māgadha fashion) Dhrstadyumna, the son, fully armed and accoutred for the act of revenge; and Krşņā-Draupadi (she of the Saga) in the full glory of beauteous maidenhood". 279 Stripping off of its linguistic intonations, basically the argument seems very sound. That Droņa might have belonged to the
277
Indo-Aryan Literature and Culture (Origins); Nagendra Nath Ghose, Varanasi, 1965. p.170. ibid. p.193. ibid pp. 192-3.
278 279
Jain Education International
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
