Varaha Purana 78.4: Adhyaya 78, Shloka 4
Names of the Four Directional Mountain-Kings and Their Lakes
Rudra’s Geographical Description
चतुर्द्दिक्षु विराजन्ते नामतः शृणुतानघाः । पूर्वे चैत्ररथं नाम दक्षिणे गन्धमादनम् । प्रभावेण सुतोयानि नवखण्डयुतानि च ॥ ७८.४ ॥
caturddikṣu virājante nāmataḥ śṛṇutānaghāḥ | pūrve caitrarathaṃ nāma dakṣiṇe gandhamādanam | prabhāveṇa sutoyāni navakhaṇḍayutāni ca || 78.4 ||
«Brillan en las cuatro direcciones—oíd sus nombres, oh inmaculados. En el oriente se llama Caitraratha; en el sur, Gandhamādana. Por su potencia existen también aguas hermosas y regiones provistas de nueve divisiones.»
Varāha
FAQs
It preserves early Purāṇic toponyms and a directional mapping style used to describe culturally significant landscapes, reflecting how textual traditions organized space through named regions and mountains.
Caitraratha (often associated in Sanskrit literature with a celestial/ideal grove linked with Kubera) and Gandhamādana (a well-known mytho-geographic mountain, frequently connected with Himalayan narratives). Precise modern identification is debated and typically treated as a literary-sacred geography rather than a single fixed cartographic site.
The verse primarily functions as descriptive sacred geography; its philosophical instruction is implicit—cultivating attentive listening and respectful recognition of named landscapes as part of cultural heritage memory.
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