Pṛthivī

The earth goddess summoned by the Buddha's earth-touching gesture (bhūmisparśa mudrā) to witness his accumulated merit, dispelling Māra; in Southeast Asia she wrings flood-waters from her hair to wash away Māra's armies.

Domains

• the earth
• witness of merit

Powers

• Bear witness to the Bodhisattva's merit
• Wring waters from her hair to drown Māra's host

Epithets

• पृथिवी devanagari · PṛthivīEarth goddess summoned as witness by the Buddha's earth-touching gestureNidānakathā (Jātaka commentary); Lalitavistara (primary)
• พระแม่ธรณี thai · Phra Mae Thorani'Holy Mother Earth' — the hair-wringing earth goddess of SE Asian BuddhismPaṭhamasambodhi; Thai-Lao tradition (secondary)

Relations

• enemy: MāraCalled to witness by the Buddha's earth-touching gesture, she routed Mara's host at the bodhimanda.Lalitavistara Sutra (primary)
• syncretism: PrithviThe Vedic earth-mother is absorbed as Sthāvarā/Dharaṇī, the silent witness who confirms the Bodhisattva's merit against Māra; cosmogonic motherhood narrows to attestation and support of the awakening.Lalitavistara ch. 21 (the earth goddess witnesses at the bhūmisparśa); cf. Ṛgveda 5.84 (Pṛthivī) (primary); Miranda Shaw, Buddhist Goddesses of India (2006), ch. 1 (secondary)
• equated with: Earth GoddessPhra Mae Thorani is the Tai naming of the Buddhist earth goddess; SE Asia adds the hair-wringing flood that drowns Māra's host, an iconography unknown in the Indian sources.Pathamasambodhi (Thai/Lao life of the Buddha), Māravijaya episode (primary); Elizabeth Guthrie, A Study of the History and Cult of the Buddhist Earth Deity in Mainland Southeast Asia (PhD diss., Canterbury, 2004) (secondary)

Sources

• existence: Lalitavistara Sūtra (primary); Southeast Asian Theravāda tradition of Phra Mae Thorani (secondary)