Govinda (govinda)

Govinda means finder or protector of cows, a name Krishna earns among the cowherds of Vrindavan and keeps for the rest of his life. It is deliberately unheroic, and the epic likes the contrast: the man addressed by a name from a cattle village is the one who arranges the destruction of the world's greatest armies. It is also the name Draupadi cries in the assembly hall, and the epic makes a point of the fact that she calls for the herdsman rather than the king.