Draupadi

Out of Drupada's fire

Drupada of Panchala, beaten by Drona's pupils and stripped of half his kingdom, held a sacrifice to obtain a son who would kill Drona. From the fire rose Dhrishtadyumna, already armed, and after him a dark young woman, and a voice from the sky said she would bring the kshatriyas to destruction. For her dark skin she was named Krishnaa; she is also Panchali, the princess of Panchala, and Yajnaseni, the daughter of the sacrifice.

Five husbands

At her swayamvara Arjuna, disguised as a brahmin, strung the great bow and struck the target. When the brothers came home to the potter's house announcing what they had begged, Kunti told them without looking to share it equally, and Vyasa settled Drupada's objection by explaining that in a former life she had asked Shiva five times for a husband. She bore a son to each brother: Prativindhya, Sutasoma, Shrutakarma, Shatanika and Shrutasena. At Indraprastha she was queen beside Yudhishthira at his imperial sacrifice.

The question in the dice hall

Yudhishthira staked her after he had already lost himself. Dushasana dragged her into the assembly by the hair, in a single garment, and she asked the court whether a man who had lost his own freedom could still stake his wife. Bhishma said the point of dharma was too subtle to decide; only Vikarna spoke for her. Karna called her a woman of five husbands and told Dushasana to strip her, but as he pulled, more cloth kept appearing. Later tellings credit Krishna with the marvel; the critical text does not name its source. Frightened by omens, Dhritarashtra offered her boons, and she used them to free her husbands and asked nothing more for herself.

Exile, Kichaka and the braid

In the forest she argued with Yudhishthira against his patience, and Jayadratha of Sindhu tried to carry her off. In the thirteenth year, disguised as the maid Sairandhri in Virata's palace, she was pursued by the general Kichaka, and Bhima killed him at night in the dancing hall. When peace was debated at Upaplavya she held out the hair Dushasana had seized and asked Krishna to remember it. Later retellings turn this into a vow not to bind her hair until it is washed in Dushasana's blood.

Victory without her sons

The Pandavas won, but on the last night Ashwatthama's raid killed her five sons and her brother Dhrishtadyumna in their sleep. She sat down to fast until death unless Ashwatthama was punished, and Bhima brought her the gem from his forehead. On the great departure she was the first to fall; Yudhishthira said her fault was loving Arjuna more than the others.

Draupadi is the epic's sharpest questioner of dharma. Her question in the hall was never properly answered, and that silence is why many readers treat the dice game, not the battlefield, as the moral centre of the Mahabharata.