Danu (Sanskrit: दनु, IAST: Danu) is a Hindu primordial goddess. She is mentioned in the Rigveda to be the mother of the eponymous race known as the danavas. The word Danu described the primeval waters that this deity perhaps embodied. In later Hinduism, she is described as the daughter of the PrajapatiDaksha and his spouse Panchajani, and the consort of the sage Kashyapa.[1]
Etymology
As a word for "rain" or "liquid", dānu is compared to Avestan dānu, "river", and further to river names like Don, Danube, Dnieper, Dniestr, etc. There is also a Danu river in Nepal. The "liquid" word is mostly neutral, but appears as feminine in Rigveda 1.54.
From Kaśyapa, Danu obtained a hundred sons proud of boons.
Among them Vipracitti, of great power, was the chief. (Others were) Dviraṣṭamūrdhā, Śakuni, Śaṅkuśirodhara, Ayomukha, Śambara, Kapila, Vāmana, Marīci, Māgadha, and Hari. Gajaśiras, Nidrādhara, Ketu, Ketuvīrya Taśakratu, Indramitragraha, Vrajanābha, Ekavastra, Mahābāhu, Vajrākṣa, Tāraka, Asiloman, Puloman, Vikurvāṇa, Mahāpura, Svarbhānu, and Vṛṣaparvan—these and others were also Danu's sons. Suprabhā was Svarbhānu's daughter, and Śacī was the daughter of Puloman.
^The European discovery of India; key indological sources of romanticism. Ganesha Publishing. "Danu, d. of Daksha, w. of Kasyapa".
^Kinsley, David (1987, reprint 2005). Hindu Goddesses: Visions of the Divine Feminine in the Hindu Religious Tradition, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, ISBN81-208-0394-9. p. 16.
