Skanda Purana — Nagara Khanda, Shloka 2
सांप्रतं शीलजां ब्रूहि नष्टवंशश्च यो भवेत् । पितामहं न जानाति न च मातामहीं निजाम् । तस्य शुद्धिः कथं कार्या नागरोऽस्मीति यो वदेत्
sāṃprataṃ śīlajāṃ brūhi naṣṭavaṃśaśca yo bhavet | pitāmahaṃ na jānāti na ca mātāmahīṃ nijām | tasya śuddhiḥ kathaṃ kāryā nāgaro'smīti yo vadet
Now explain the purification grounded in conduct (śīla): if someone’s lineage is lost—he does not know his paternal grandfather nor his own maternal grandmother—how is purification to be done for one who declares, ‘I am a Nāgara’?
Ānarta
Tirtha: Hāṭakeśvara-kṣetra (contextual)
Type: kshetra
Listener: Viśvāmitra (addressed indirectly as ‘brūhi’)
Scene: A worried petitioner speaks of not knowing grandparents; elders listen gravely; symbolic broken family tree behind him; a path leading to a temple/tīrtha suggests restoration through dharma and pilgrimage rites.
FAQs
When lineage proof is unavailable, dharma also considers conduct (śīla) as a basis for determining purification and eligibility.
The inquiry occurs within the Hāṭakeśvara-kṣetra-māhātmya framework in the Nāgara-khaṇḍa.
A request for the method of śuddhi for a naṣṭavaṃśa (unknown lineage) claimant to Nāgara status, to be determined via śīla.