Matsya & Satyavati's Birth Story

Uparichara was a very subtle and greedy king who appeared to refrain from any type of self-indulgence in wealth, food, women, etc. due to his overwhelming faith in me, Vishnu, and the other gods. We typically appreciate this type of obedience, but we feared the king’s intense level of self-discipline. We thought that he was trying to win us over so that the universe would initiate him as a new god with powers we have never seen in this world. This could cause him to feel so supreme that he might try and consume us all, granting him the celestial powers that we possess, all for himself. The earth would be in danger if just one god had all of that power stored within him, so we had to do something about it. Therefore, we elected Indra to be the one that should offer King Uparichara a gift that we knew he would not be able to resist -- a crystal car. This car was extremely special and unearthly. It was a flying car that left a rainbow trail in the sky. The car could drive itself, and the ride was so smooth that the king felt as though he was flying all by himself, without the aid of a celestial automobile. The king was so excited for this car that the gods had gifted him that he signed the terms and conditions for this gift without even reading the agreement.

The night before his wedding, the king took his beloved fiancée for a ride in his crystal. The view was like nothing she had ever seen before. They were so high in the sky that they felt like they could touch the stars and the moon. It was the most romantic thing they had ever done together. With no light except for that which came from the moon, the king and his fiancée both began to feel a little frisky. Without further ado, they joined the mile-high club. This was the best night of their lives until we had to punish King Uparichara for allowing another human to enjoy his celestial car (which was one of the things he unknowingly agreed not to do upon accepting the car).

His bride to be was killed on impact as we evicted her from the car when they reached their highest point in the sky, and his semen fell into the river flowing just beneath him. The semen entered the water and a small puffer fish swallowed it the second it entered the water. The puffer fish grew so much over the next nine months that she believed that she had lost the ability to deflate her body all by herself.

Nine months later, a skilled fisherman caught the puffer fish. The fish was humongous and he presented it to King Uparichara, feeling fully confident that the king would give him some sort of reward for this unique find. However, the puffer fish exploded the moment the fisherman revealed it to the king and two babies – a boy and a girl – emerged from the remnants of the fish. Thoughts of the king's potential successor to the throne penetrated his brain now that his fiancée was dead and King Uparichara decided to keep the baby boy for himself. The baby girl reeked of a fishy smell that the king was very uninterested in, so he gifted her to the fisherman.

This is the birth story Satyavati and her twin brother, Matsya.

Author's Note: I decided to write from the point of view of the god Vishnu, because he acts to preserve the universe which would explain why him and the other gods were so concerned with King Uparichara's motives. Then, I extended the background story of the birth of Matsya and his twin sister Satyavati. In the PDE version of the Mahabharata, King Uparichara is cursed by the gods because they are scared that he is trying to rob them of their power, so they gave him a car that he could drive through the sky and made his semen fall in the river below. I decided to stick to the original storyline in this way, but wanted the car to be more of a symbol of friendship to lightly encourage Uparichara not to steal the gods' powers. Then, I allowed the gods to curse him in the same way in my version of the story once he broke their agreement with the acceptance of the flying car. My changes to the story also allowed me to include a fiancée for Uparichara which further explains why he chose to keep just the baby boy at the end of the story. I also thought it would be fun to include how the two babies were born from the fish since it was obviously not a traditional pregnancy.

Bibliography: Mahabharata PDE, Part A -- Vyasa and Ganesha.

Image Information: Large Puffer Fish. Marine Puffer Fish: The Inflation Great!