Talk:Mother of Ashoka

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It seems that bot has made an error, no duplicate topic exists.Itsalleasy (talk) 16:52, 23 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Title

"Subhadrangi" is the name of Ashoka's mother in an apocryphal legend. The other legends variously name her as Dhamma or Janapadakalyani, and give different accounts of her.

To quote Nayanjot Lahiri (Ashoka in Ancient India, p. 52): "We will call the woman simply his 'mother' because her true name eludes us. She is known by various names [...] Buddhist texts do not think it necessary to give her a stable name."

As such, if this article is about the legendary character, the details about Dhamma and Janapadakalyani should be removed from this article. Alternatively, if it is intended to about Ashoka's mother, it should be moved to Mother of Ashoka. Does anyone have any concerns? utcursch | talk 17:32, 28 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. However, I find it disconcerting that Lahiri also lists Durdhara as another name for the mother as it's also the name of his grandmother. To play devil's advocate, both the Ashokavadana and versions of the Divyavadana name her as Subhadrangi … So a case could be made for preferring that name. It might perhaps be prudent to read up on what Guruge (in the source that Lahiri cites and recommends) actually states in his book before proceeding. There also needs to be consistency in how we tackle this subject (as well as related ones such as Vitashoka, Susima, Tissa, etc.) across all Mauryan articles.--Cpt.a.haddock (talk) (please ping when replying) 12:09, 29 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I've come across several modern writers using the name Subhadrangi while narrating the legend contained in that text, but according to Ashoka in Ancient India, the Ashokavadana (which is part of the Divyavadana anthology) does not name the king's mother as "Subhadrangi". (p. 323 - "In the Ashokavadana, Ashoka's mother is not named." John S. Strong's translation of Ashokavadana (pp. 204-205) doesn't name the mother either. utcursch | talk 16:42, 10 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]