Kadru’s Family Tree

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Family

• Daksha(parent),Prasuti(parent),Aditi(sibling),Diti(sibling),Rati(sibling),Sati(sibling),Vinata(sibling)— Marriage

  Daksha and Prasuti begot numerous daughters whose marriages shaped the cosmos — Aditi bore the Adityas, Diti the Daityas, Kadru the Nagas, Vinata the eagles, and Rati became goddess of desire, while Sati's union with Shiva would end in self-immolation at her father's ill-fated yajna.

• Kashyapa(spouse),Nagas(child),Shesha(child),Takshaka(child),Vasuki(child)— Marriage

  Kashyapa wed Kadru, one of Daksha's daughters, and from their union sprang a thousand serpents — the Nagas who inhabit Patala, with Shesha the eldest, Vasuki the king, and Takshaka the most wrathful among them.

Enemy of

• Garuda

  Kadru enslaved Garuda's mother Vinata through a deceptive wager over the color of the celestial horse Uchchaihshravas, then cheated by having her serpent sons blacken the horse's tail. This treachery bound Garuda to servitude until he could win his mother's freedom.

• Vinata

  Vinata and Kadru, co-wives of Kashyapa, wagered on the color of the horse Uchchaihshravas. Kadru cheated by ordering her serpent sons to darken the horse's tail, winning the bet and enslaving Vinata.

Associated with

• Nagas

  When many of the Nagas refused to blacken the tail of Uchchaihshravas to fix her wager, Kadru cursed the Nagas to perish in Janamejaya's serpent sacrifice — a mother's curse that would drive the central narrative of the Mahabharata's frame story.