Shloka 46

स्त्री-विलापः — गान्धार्याः रणभूमिदर्शनं शापवचनं च

Battlefield Lament and Gāndhārī’s Curse

Devanagari script

तवाप्येवं हतसुता निहतज्ञातिबान्धवा: । स्त्रिय: परिपतिष्यन्ति यथैता भरतस्त्रिय:,इन भरतवंशकी स्त्रियोंके समान तुम्हारे कुलकी स्त्रियाँ भी पुत्रों तथा भाई-बन्धुओंके मारे जानेपर इसी तरह सगे-सम्बन्धियोंकी लाशोंपर गिरेंगी

Transliteration

tavāpy evaṃ hatasutā nihatajñātibāndhavāḥ | striyaḥ paripatiṣyanti yathaitā bharatastriyaḥ ||

Translation

Vaiśampāyana berkata: “Demikian juga dalam keturunanmu sendiri, para wanita—kehilangan putera dan apabila kaum kerabat serta sanak saudara terbunuh—akan rebah dengan cara yang sama, sebagaimana wanita-wanita dari wangsa Bharata ini telah jatuh menimpa jasad orang-orang yang mereka kasihi.”

Word by Word

तवof you/your

अपिalso/even

एवम्thus/in this way

हतसुताwhose sons are slain

निहतज्ञातिबान्धवाःwhose kinsmen and relatives are slain

स्त्रियःwomen

परिपतिष्यन्तिwill fall down all around

यथाas/just as

एताःthese

भरतस्त्रियःthe women of the Bharata (race)

Speaker

वैशम्पायन उवाच

Characters & Entities

Vaiśampāyana

Bharata women (Kuru/Bharata lineage women)

Character Dynamics

Dharma Sankata (Moral Dilemma)

War Context

Verse Rasa (Emotional Essence)

Philosophical Teaching

Political Layer

Geographic Context

Cross References

Meter (Chandas)

Sandhi Notes

Educational Q&A

What is the core teaching?

The verse underscores the universal and reciprocal consequences of war: the same bereavement and collapse into grief that afflicts the Bharata women will also befall the women of the opposing side. It frames violence as producing predictable, shared human suffering across lineages.

What is happening in the narrative?

In the Strīparvan’s lamentation setting after the great slaughter, the narrator (Vaiśampāyana) voices a grim parallel: as the Kuru/Bharata women mourn their dead, so too will women in the other lineage, once their sons and kinsmen are slain, fall upon the corpses of their relatives in the same manner.