Dirghatama was a brilliant man who was given in marriage to Pradveshi. Pradveshi had many sons by him. However, she got weary of taking care of him and therefore, set him adrift on a raft. This draft went downstream on the river Ganga and it took Dirghatama to the eastern part of India, where he was rescued by a king called Vali. Vali realised this was a great sage and invited him to go to his wife, Sudheshna, and father children. The queen was uncomfortable giving her body up to a strange priest, so she sent her servant in her stead. The servant girl gave birth to many children who became great sages. Finally, the king forced the queen to have intercourse with Dirghatama and she bore him five sons, Anga, Vanga, Kalinga, Pundara and Shushma.

Anga means southern Bihar, while Vanga, Pundara, and Shushma refer to parts of Bengal. Kalinga represents Odisha, indicating the Eastern part of India. This has led to speculation if this elaborate story is a proto-history of how Vedic culture spread to eastern part of India through poets such as Dirghatama.
These stories refer to a time when marriage was not associated with fidelity and women had sex with men other than husbands such as brothers-in-law (Brishaspati, in this case) and wise guests (Dirghatama). Mamatha stops Brihaspati's sexual advances, not on the ground that she was his sister-in-law, but on the grounds that she is already pregnant: meaning she had no moral issue with Brihaspati being her brother-in-law. Sudeshna is coaxed by her husband to have intercourse with an educated guest to get smart children. But she takes long to get convinced.

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These practices of course, ceased after Shwetaketu's patriarchal decree, mentioned in the Mahabharata, which forced a woman to be faithful to her husband or only have relations with men he approved of.

The stories perhaps suggest violent confrontation between Vedic sages and tribal kings as the latter slowly assimilated into the Hindu fold through change in food habits and sex practices. This is speculation of course if one sees these mythologies as proto-history.

The author writes and lectures on the relevance of mythology in modern times. Reach him at devdutt.pattanaik@ mid-day.com

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