Ganga
गंगा gangaThe most sacred river of Hinduism, personified as a goddess who descends from heaven to earth. Bathing in the Ganga is held to purify, and immersing the ash and bone of the cremated (asthi-visarjan) in her waters is believed to aid the departed toward release.
Explained in depth in Who is Ganga?Where this term appears
- Who is Murugan? Deities
… for anyone to bear; it is carried by Agni the fire-god and the river Ganga, set down at last in a bed of reeds, and there nursed by the six Krittikas.
- Who is Parvati? Deities
… gods interrupt; Shiva's seed is cast out, carried by fire and by the Ganga, and finally nursed by the Krittikas, the Pleiades, from whom the boy takes his name.
- Who is Saraswati? Deities
… holding that Vishnu first had three consorts, Lakshmi, Saraswati and Ganga, who were later redistributed among the great gods after some discord, so that Saraswati passed to Brahma and Ganga to Shiva.
- Who is Shiva? Deities
As Gaṅgādhara , bearer of the Ganga, Shiva is read as the one who breaks the force of an overwhelming descent so that finite creatures can receive it.
- Hinduism and the Coming of Islam History
The traffic ran both ways: the sultan Muhammad bin Tughluq, the chronicles record, had Ganga water carried forty days' journey for his own table, a Hindu king's ritual taken up by a Muslim one.
- Jagannath Puri and the Ratha Yatra Temples
History: the Eastern Ganga kings Now the record, as opposed to the legend.
- Konark: The Sun Temple Temples
That king was Narasimhadeva I of the Eastern Ganga dynasty, who reigned roughly from 1238 to 1264.
- Nagara, Dravida and Vesara: The Styles of the Hindu Temple Temples
The great age runs from about the 7th to the 13th century, carried by the Pallavas and Cholas in the south, the Chandelas in the centre, the Hoysalas in the Deccan, and the Eastern Gangas on the Kalinga coast.