Ravi River

O Gangā, Yamunā, Sarasvatī, Shutudrī, Parushnī, hear my praise! ~ Rigveda

The Ravi River is a transboundary river crossing northwestern India and eastern Pakistan. It is one of five rivers associated with the Punjab region.

Quotes

• “Bull, hurler of the four-edged rain-producer with both his arms, strong, mighty, most heroic; Wearing as wool Paruṣṇī for adornment, whose joints for sake of friendship he hath covered.”
  • Rigveda IV.22.2, as translated by Ralph T. H. Griffith**

• “Fair-gleaming, on Paruṣṇī they have clothed themselves in robes of wool, And with their chariot tires they cleave the rock asunder in their might.”
  • Rigveda V.52.9, as translated by Ralph T. H. Griffith**

• “Fools, in their folly fain to waste her waters, they parted inexhaustible Paruṣṇī. Lord of the Earth, he with his might repressed them: still lay the herd and the affrighted herdsman.” “As to their goal they sped to their destruction: they sought Paruṣṇī; e’en the swift returned not. Indra abandoned, to Sudās the manly, the swiftly flying foes, unmanly babblers.”
  • Rigveda VII.18.8-9, as translated by Ralph T. H. Griffith**

• “The very truth do I declare to thee, Paruṣṇī, mighty flood. Waters! No man is there who gives more horses than Śaviṣṭha gives.”
  • Rigveda VIII.74.15, as translated by Ralph T. H. Griffith**

• Favour ye this my laud, O Gangā, Yamunā, O Sutudri, Paruṣṇī and Sarasvatī: With Asikni, Vitasta, O Marudvrdha, O Ārjīkīya with Susoma hear my call. First with Trstama thou art eager to flow forth, with Rasā, and Susartu, and with Svetya here, With Kubha; and with these, Sindhu and Mehatnu, thou seekest in thy course Krumu and Gomati.
  • Rigveda X.75.5-6
  • Variant: O Gangā, Yamunā, Sarasvatī, Shutudrī (Sutlej), Parushnī (Ravi), hear my praise! Hear my call, O Asiknī (Chenab), Marudvridhā (Maruvardhvan), Vitastā (Jhelum) with Ārjīkiyā and Sushomā. First you flow united with Trishtāmā, with Susartu and Rasā, and with Svetyā, O Sindhu (Indus) with Kubhā (Kabul) to Gomati (Gumal or Gomal), with Mehatnū to Krumu (Kurram), with whom you proceed together.

• There is no doubt that the Rawi, even more than some of the other rivers constituting the Panch Nad or Panj Ab, has changed more or less from one side to the other and back again time after time; and thus to attempt to “identify" places along its present banks with others supposed to have existed more than twenty-two centuries ago, is so absurd as to require no further comment.
  • Raverty, H.G., The Mihran of Sind and its Tributaries : a Geographical and Historical Study" , quoted in Chakrabarti, D. K., & Saini, S. (2009). The problem of the sarasvati river and notes on the archaeological geography of haryana and indian panjab. Aryan Books International.