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SATYAVRATA

Volume 18 · 360 words · 1810 Edition

or MENU, in Indian mythology, is believed by the Hindoos to have reigned over the whole world in the earliest age of their chronology, and to have resided in the country of Dravira on the coast of the eastern Indian peninsula. His patronymic name was Vivasvata, or child of the sun. In the Bha-gavat we are informed, that the Lord of the universe, intending to preserve him from the sea of destruction, caused by the depravity of the age, thus told him how he was to act. "In seven days from the present time, O thou tamer of enemies, the three worlds will be plunged in an ocean of death; but, in the midst of the destroying waves, a large vessel, sent by me for thy use, shall stand before thee. Then shalt thou take all medicinal herbs, all the variety of seeds; and, accompanied by seven saints, encircled by pairs of all brute animals, thou shalt enter the spacious ark and continue in it, secure from the flood on one immense ocean without light, except the radiance of thy holy companions. When the ship shall be agitated by an impetuous wind, thou shalt fasten it with a large sea-serpent on my horn; for I will be near thee: drawing the vessel, with thee and thy attendants, I will remain on the ocean, O chief of men, until a night of Brahma shall be completely ended. Thou shalt then know my true greatness, rightly named the supreme Godhead; by my favour, all thy questions shall be answered, and thy mind abundantly instructed." All this is said to have been accomplished; and the story is evidently that of Noah disguised by Asiatic fiction and allegory. It proves, as Sir William Jones has rightly observed, an ancient Indian tradition of the universal deluge described by Moses; and enables us to trace the connexion between the eastern and western traditions relating to that event. The same learned author has shown it to be in the highest degree probable, that the Satyavrata of India is the Cronus of Greece and the Saturn of Italy. See SATURN; and Asiatic Researches, vol. i. p. 230, &c.