Arjuna and the Weapons in the Shami Tree
At the end of their exile the Pandavas hid their weapons in a shami tree. A year later Arjuna, disguised as a dance teacher, climbed it to take back his bow. Why people still worship the shami on Dussehra.
In Maharashtra, Karnataka and much of the Deccan, Vijayadashami has a second story beside Rama's — and a tree at the centre of it. This one comes from the Mahabharata.
The thirteenth year
The Pandavas had lost everything at the dice game and agreed to the terms: twelve years in the forest, and a thirteenth year in disguise. If they were recognised during that thirteenth year, the whole exile would begin again.
They chose to spend it in the kingdom of Virata, as servants at his court. Yudhishthira would be a dice-playing companion to the king; Bhima a cook; Nakula a groom for the horses; Sahadeva a cowherd; Draupadi a maid to the queen. [Arjuna](/gods/arjuna), the greatest archer alive, would be Brihannala, a dance teacher to the king's daughter.
That left one problem: their weapons. Five servants could not walk into a royal city carrying Arjuna's Gandiva bow, and they could not leave them behind.
The tree
Outside the city, near the cremation ground, they found a great shami tree, thick and hard to climb. They unstrung their bows, wrapped all their weapons tightly, and tied them high in its branches. Then they hung a corpse from the tree as well — so that anyone passing would keep well away, and anyone who asked would be told it was an old custom of their family.
Then they walked into Virata's city, and for a year, nobody knew them.
The cattle raid
At the very end of the year, the Kauravas — Duryodhana, Karna, Bhishma, Drona and the rest — raided Virata's cattle. The king and his army were away fighting elsewhere. The only one left to defend the city was the young prince Uttara, who boasted that he would drive them all off if only he had a good charioteer.
Brihannala, the dance teacher, offered to drive.
When Uttara saw the Kaurava army — Bhishma, Drona, Karna — his courage drained away and he jumped from the chariot and ran. Brihannala caught him, sat him down at the reins, and drove to the shami tree. "Climb it," Arjuna told him. "Bring down what's tied there."
Uttara came down with the Gandiva. Then Arjuna told him who they all were.
Arjuna strung the bow and blew his conch. The Kauravas recognised the sound at once. He fought them alone and drove them back — and in the end used a weapon of stupefaction that put the whole army to sleep, and took their fine upper garments back to Virata's daughter, as he had promised her.
Why the shami on Dussehra
The Mahabharata does not say that this happened on Vijayadashami; that link belongs to the tradition that grew around the story. In it, the day Arjuna took his weapons back out of the shami became the day on which weapons, tools and warriors are honoured — which is why kings once marched out on campaign on Vijayadashami, and why Ayudha Puja honours tools on the ninth day.
On Dussehra, in many places, people still go to a shami tree, worship it, and recite a verse that names both stories: the shami removes sin, destroys enemies, held the bow of Arjuna, and is dear to Rama. In Maharashtra, leaves of the shami — or of the apta tree — are exchanged among friends and family as "gold" (sona), with the words "take gold, and stay golden".
To carry from this story: What made Arjuna great was not only his bow, but that he could put it down for a year, live as somebody else, and be ready to pick it up again the moment it was needed.
See also: [Rama and the Untimely Worship of Durga](/learn/all/rama-and-the-untimely-worship-of-durga) and the series overview, [Navaratri, explained](/learn/all/navaratri-the-nine-nights-explained).
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