Apsara (apsaras)

Apsaras are celestial dancers of Indra's court, sent down to break the austerities of sages whose accumulated power is starting to alarm the gods. The Mahabharata treats them with sympathy as often as suspicion: Shakuntala is the daughter of one such mission, Urvashi curses Arjuna to a year of impotence when he refuses her and calls her a mother of his line, and Tilottama is made from the finest particles of everything in order to destroy two invincible brothers. The curse Urvashi lays turns out to be exactly the disguise Arjuna needs in the thirteenth year.