Navaratri Night 1 — Shailaputri, Daughter of the Mountain
Sati walks uninvited into her father's sacrifice and gives up her body there. She is born again as the daughter of the Himalaya — and the nine nights begin.
The first night belongs to Shailaputri — shaila is a mountain, putri a daughter. To know why the nine nights begin with her, you have to begin one life earlier.
Sati
Sati was the daughter of Daksha, a great patriarch, and she chose for her husband the one god her father could not bear: [Shiva](/gods/shiva), ash-smeared, matted-haired, living in cremation grounds, owing nothing to anyone.
Daksha held a vast sacrifice and invited every god but one. Sati heard of it and wanted to go — it was her father's house. Shiva warned her: you will be insulted there, and you will not bear it. She went anyway.
In her father's hall no one rose to greet her, and there was no share of the offering set aside for her husband. Daksha spoke of Shiva with open contempt in front of the assembled gods. Sati answered him once — that a body born from a man who could speak like that was not one she wished to keep — and then she sat down, turned her attention inward, and gave up her body in the fire of her own yoga.
The Bhagavata and Shiva Puranas both tell what followed: Shiva's grief became rage, [Virabhadra](/gods/virabhadra) sprang from his matted hair, and the sacrifice was destroyed. The story of Shiva carrying Sati's body across the earth, and of the places where it fell becoming the Shakti Peethas, is told in the later Puranas.
The mountain's daughter
Sati was born again to Himavan, the king of the mountains, and his queen Mena. They named her [Parvati](/gods/parvati) — "she of the mountain" — and the poet Kalidasa opens his Kumarasambhava with her birth, calling her Daksha's daughter returned.
This is the form worshipped on the first night. Shailaputri rides a bull — Nandi, Shiva's own mount, already beside her before the marriage has happened — and holds a trident in her right hand and a lotus in her left. A crescent moon rests on her forehead. She is the Goddess at the very beginning of her story: newly born, and already turned towards Shiva.
How the first night is kept
The first morning is the morning of ghatasthapana, when the kalasha is installed and the barley is sown. It is fitting that the mountain's daughter presides over it. The mountain is the most rooted thing there is, and the first day is about establishing a foundation that the next eight days will rest on.
What is old here, and what is not
Sati's death at Daksha's sacrifice and her rebirth as Parvati are among the oldest Shaiva stories — the sacrifice is already told in the Mahabharata, and Parvati as the mountain's daughter in Kalidasa. That this form is called Shailaputri and worshipped on the first night comes from the Devi Kavacha, where her name stands first in the list of nine. The iconography — bull, trident, lotus — belongs to the later devotional tradition.
To carry from the first night: Sati did not argue at length and she did not bargain. She knew where she stood, said so once, and accepted the cost. The nine nights start from that kind of certainty.
Next: [Night 2 — Brahmacharini](/learn/all/navaratri-night-2-brahmacharini) · The series: [Navaratri, explained](/learn/all/navaratri-the-nine-nights-explained)
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Navaratri Night 2 — Brahmacharini, the Austerity That Moved Shiva
When beauty failed to reach Shiva, Parvati went into the forest and did not come back until he came to her. The second night honours the young woman who gave up even leaves.
Navaratri Night 3 — Chandraghanta, the Bell and the Wedding
Shiva arrives for his wedding with ghosts and goblins, and the bride's mother faints. The third night honours the bride who stood her ground — a story the devotional tradition reads into a name.
Navaratri Night 5 — Skandamata, Mother of the War God
A demon who could be killed only by Shiva's son, a child carried by fire and river and raised by six star-mothers — and the goddess who holds him on her lap.
Navaratri Night 8 — Mahagauri, the Dark Goddess Made Bright
Shiva teases Parvati about her dark skin, and she leaves to do austerities until she shines. Placed straight after the darkest night, the eighth is its answer.
Navaratri Night 4 — Kushmanda, the Smile That Lit the Dark
Before there was anything, there was darkness — and then a goddess smiled. The fourth night's story is a creation story built entirely out of a name, and it says so.