Story 19 - The Faithless Princess

IN a certain country there is a Prince, it is said. The Prince, saying that women are faithless, does not marry.

The God Shakra having ascertained this, came in the appearance of a man, and asked at the hand of the Prince whether if he created a Princess out of his own very body, and gave her to him, he would be willing to take her in marriage.

The Prince said,

“It is good.”

Afterwards the God Shakra created a Princess from the Prince’s body, and gave her to him.

When the Prince and Princess, having got married, had been living together for a very long time, the Princess associated with a Nagaya.^[1] When they had been thus for a long time, the Princess and the Nagaya spoke together as to how to kill the Princess’s Prince.

Then the Nagaya said,

“Ask at the hand of the Prince where the Prince’s death is. After you have got to know the place where his death is, I will bite ^[2] him there.”

After that, the Princess asked at the hand of the Prince,

“Where is your death ?”

The Prince did not tell her. Every day the Princess was asking it. On a certain day the Prince said,

“To-day my death is in my thumb.”

Then the Princess told the Nagaya,

“He said that his death is in his thumb.”

So the Nagaya went [in his snake form, as a.cobra], and stopped on the path on which the Prince was going for his bath, in order to bite^[2] him.

Afterwards, the Prince’s people went first; the Prince went in the middle. Then the people who went first saw the Nagaya, and killed it..

Afterwards, the people and the Prince having returned from bathing, the Prince told at the hand of the Princess,

“As we were going to bathe to-day a cobra was on the path ; my people killed it.”

The Princess, clasping her hands with grief, asked,

“Where was it ?”

The Prince told her of the place where the cobra was staying, and she knew that it was the Nagaya.

Afterwards the Princess having given gold to the goldsmith, and having got a waist-chain made, told him to make a case for it. The goldsmith made it, and gave it. Then the Princess went to the place where the cobra was, and cut off its hood ; and placing the cobra in ‘the case of the golden waist-chain, the Princess put it. round her waist.

Having it there, when they had eaten and drunk in the evening, and lighted the lamp in the house, both of them went into the house.

Then the Princess said to the Prince,

“I will ask you a riddle. Should you be unable to explain it, I will kill you. Should you explain it, you shall kill me.”

The Prince said “Ha,” and both of them swore it.

The Princess saying,

The Naga belt	Naga patiya
(Is) the golden waist-chain.	Ran hawadiya.
Explain (it), friend.	Tora, sakiya.

 
told the Prince to solve it. For fifteen paeyas (six hours), without extinguishing the lamp, he tried and tried to explain it. He could not. So she was to kill the Prince next day.

A Devatawa (godling) who drank the smoke of the lamp of that house, was there looking on [invisibly] until the lamp was extinguished. After the lamp was put out, having drunk a little smoke, he took a little that was only slightly burnt with him for his wife. The Devatawa and Devatawi lived in an Ironwood tree on the roadside.

This Prince’s elder sister, and the man to whom she was given in marriage, having set off to come to the Prince’s city, stayed that night at the resting-place under the Ironwood tree.

Then that Devatawa having brought a little of the under-bumt smoke of the lamp, after he had given it to the Devatawi she quarrelled with him until fifteen paeyas (six hours) had gone, saying,

“Where have you been ?”

The Devatawa said,

“Do not quarrel. In such and such a city, such and such a Prince’s Princess having associated with a Nagaya, the Prince’s people killed the Nagaya.”

Having cut off the Nagaya’s hood, and laid aside her golden waist-chain, putting it round her waist in order to kill the Prince, because of her anger at the killing of the Nagaya, the Princess told a riddle to the Prince.

Having sworn that should the Prince be unable to solve it she is to kill the Prince : should he solve it he is to kill the Princess, the Princess said,

The Naga belt
Is the golden waist-chain.
Explain it, friend.

“From the evening, without extinguishing the lamp, he tried to solve it. The Prince could not explain it. After fifteen paeyas had gone by, he put out the light. Up to the very time when he extinguished the lamp, so long I remained there. She said that she will kill the Prince to-morrow.”

Hearing it, there stayed below the Ironwood tree the Prince’s elder sister, and the man to whom she was given. After having heard it, as it became light, when they were coming along to the Prince’s house, they saw from afar that they were going to behead the Prince.

The elder sister said from afar,

“A! Don’t behead him. I will solve that riddle.”

Having come near, the Prince’s elder sister explained the riddle in the manner stated by the Devatawa. So the Prince was saved, and they beheaded the Princess.

North-western Province.

 

Note:

In Folk-Tales of Kashmir (Knowles), 2nd ed., p. 227, a Fakir split a King, and made a wife for him from half his body, but warned him that she would be unfaithful. She fell in love with one of his wazirs, but they were detected, and she was killed.

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

A supernatural being who could take at will either a human form or the shape of a cobra (naya or naga).

[2]:

Dohta karanawa = Dashta k., to give a poisonous bite.