Ikshvaku Kings: The Tales of Kukshi, Bahuka, and Sagara

Early-Middle Treta Yuga

The Ikṣvāku dynasty, descending from the first Manu, Vaivasvata Manu, was known as the Sūryavaṃśa—the Solar Dynasty—because its kings traced their lineage to Vivasvān, the Sun-god.

Manu’s eldest son Ikṣvāku, born from a yajña performed for progeny, became the first ruler of Ayodhyā. His kingdom lay in Kosala, a land that prospered on the banks of the Sarayū, and his descendants came to rule it for many ages, maintaining order and dharma on earth.

From Ikṣvāku arose generations of kings—virtuous, brave, and powerful—who upheld rāja-dharma and the sanctity of sacrifice. Among them was Kukṣī, a name seldom sung but integral to the golden chain of the Sun-born monarchs.

Kukṣī: Keeper of the Line

Kukṣī was the son of Ikṣvāku, born during the age when men still walked close to the gods.

Though few legends survive about him, ancient bards remember him as a dhārmika rājā—a righteous king who expanded the borders of Kosala eastward.

Under Kukṣī’s reign, the early solar capital of Ayodhyā grew from a fortress town to a seat of civilization.

Temples to the Adityas (devas - sons of Sage Kashyapa and Aditi) rose under his patronage, and he strengthened the lineage by instituting laws that defined royal succession and ritual order.

His descendants ruled for many centuries. Among them were kings like Vikukṣi, Śaśāda, Purañjaya (Indravāha), and Kakutstha—names that would later become epithets of grandeur in the Rāmāyaṇa’s genealogies.

Bāhuka: The Fall of the Solar Throne

Many generations after Kukṣī, the throne of Ayodhyā passed to King Vṛka, and from him to his son Bāhuka, also known as Bahu in the Purāṇas.

Bāhuka was a warrior-king of noble heart, yet his age was one of unrest. Neighboring clans—the Haihayas (descendants of Yadu) and the Tālajaṅghas, along with allies like the Śakas, Yavanas, Pahlavas, Kambojas, and Pāradas—grew powerful and ambitious.

Seeing Ayodhyā’s riches and the prestige of the Solar throne, they conspired to overthrow the Ikṣvāku rule.

The Brahmāṇḍa Purāṇa tells that these tribes attacked with mighty armies, their chariots flashing like the storm, and Bāhuka’s hosts were broken upon the plain. His capital was seized, and the sacred flag of the Sun was trampled in the dust.

Broken in body and spirit, Bāhuka fled eastward, taking refuge with his queens in the āśrama of the sage Aurva, a descendant of Bhṛgu.

There, stripped of wealth and power, he lived in penance and sorrow.

Old age found him in exile, his lineage scattered, his people enslaved.

Among his wives was Queen Yādavī (sometimes called Vijayā). Loyal and faithful, she was then pregnant with the heir of the Solar line.

But jealousy brewed among the co-wives. One of them, consumed by envy that her rival bore the royal child, secretly mixed poison (gara) into Yādavī’s food.

The queen’s body resisted death, yet the poison entered her womb, afflicting the unborn child.

Because of this, Yādavī’s pregnancy lingered for seven long years, and the poison mingled with the infant’s essence.

When Bāhuka died in that forest refuge, the widowed Yādavī sought to ascend the pyre with him, but the sage Aurva forbade it:

“Do not yield to despair, O Queen. You bear within you the flame of kingship yet unextinguished.

The world’s balance rests on that child’s birth.”

Moved by his words, she stayed her hand. Time passed, and she gave birth to a son—dark-eyed, radiant, yet marked by the memory of poison.

Aurva named him Sāgara—literally, “Sa-gara,” “he who was born with poison.”

Thus was born the child who would one day reclaim his forefathers’ honor.

Note: Genealogy may differ slightly across scriptures.

Sāgara: The Restorer of the Earth

Raised under the sage Aurva’s care, Sāgara learned the Vedas, the science of arms, and the principles of kingship.

Aurva, knowing the destiny that burned in the boy, bestowed upon him divine weapons, including the Āgneya astra, the Fire-weapon, saying:

“You are born to cleanse the earth of adharma, O child of Bahu.

Let this weapon aid you in burning away its impurities.”

When Sāgara came of age, he gathered loyal warriors and set forth westward. He first defeated the petty chiefs who had taken advantage of his father’s fall. Then, one by one, he waged war against the Haihayas, Tālajaṅghas, and their allies.

In the Brahmāṇḍa Purāṇa and Vishṇu Purāṇa, it is said that “Sāgara, armed with the Fire-weapon, annihilated the Tālajaṅghas as the sun dries up dew.”

He reclaimed Ayodhyā, restoring the banners of the Solar House.

The Reclaiming of the World

The purāṇas describe that in the process of defeating the Tālajaṅghas, Sāgara “reclaimed the earth,” meaning both the political restoration of the Solar dominion and the cosmic cleansing of the land from anarchy.

Where once the sacred order (ṛta) had been broken, it now flowed again under the Sun’s light.

In allegorical sense, Sāgara’s reclamation represents the restoration of dharma after adharma’s storm—the victory of inner fire over poison, of purity over corruption.

Thus, the child born from poison became the purifier of the world. However, the tale did not end here.

The Boon of Two Mothers

Pleased by his devotion to righteousness, Aurva granted Sagara a rare choice of blessing:

“You shall have either one son who will continue your lineage or sixty thousand sons who will bring you glory. Choose, O King, which destiny you desire.”

Sagara, wise yet ambitious, asked both his queens to choose separately. His first queen, Keśinī, chose to bear one son who would perpetuate the royal line.

His second queen, Sumati (sister of the divine bird Garuḍa), chose to bear sixty thousand sons who would bring him unparalleled fame.

After many years of penance and sacred rites, their wishes were fulfilled. Keśinī bore a single son named Asamañja, while Sumati carried in her womb a great mass of energy.

From that mass, Aurva divided and shaped sixty thousand embryos, which he placed into earthen jars filled with clarified butter.

After a thousand years of incubation, the jars broke open, and sixty thousand sons emerged, radiant and powerful as tongues of flame.

The Wayward Son: Asamañja

Asamañja, Sagara’s eldest son, grew into a cruel and capricious prince. He delighted in tormenting the children of Ayodhyā — seizing them and casting them into the Sarayū river before their horrified parents. Though the boys miraculously resurfaced unharmed (due to his latent divine powers), the people’s outrage was immense.

Grieved, Sagara banished Asamañja from Ayodhyā. But Asamañja’s son, Aṃśumān, was the opposite of his father — noble, wise, and virtuous. Through him, the line would be redeemed in the future.

The Aśvamedha: Theft of the Sacrificial Horse

His conquest did not end there. He undertook the Aśvamedha Yajña, the horse sacrifice of imperial sovereignty, declaring his suzerainty over the four quarters.

He released a consecrated horse to roam freely across the Earth, guarded by his sixty thousand sons. Wherever the horse wandered unchallenged, that land was declared subject to Sagara’s rule.

But fate intervened. One day, the sacred horse vanished. The princes scoured the earth, overturning mountains and tearing through the surface of the world in search of it. Their fiery strength and wrath shook the realms.

In their furious digging, they broke through to the subterranean worlds — the domains of serpents and nāgas — leaving behind vast trenches that later filled with water and became the oceans (hence their name Sāgara).

Encounter with Sage Kapila

In the depths of the Earth, the princes finally discovered the stolen horse — grazing peacefully beside a meditating ascetic of golden radiance. It was Sage Kapila, a manifestation of Viṣṇu himself, absorbed in meditation.

Mistaking him for the thief, the sons of Sagara rushed upon him in arrogance, their weapons blazing with celestial fire.

When they disturbed his meditation, Kapila (considered in some accounts as Lord Vishnu himself) opened his eyes — and from his glance burst a flame of divine energy that reduced all sixty thousand princes to ashes.

Their bodies were gone, and their souls, burdened by the sin of anger and pride, remained trapped, unliberated. It would be Aṃśumān, Sagara's grandson, who would set out in search of the lost sons.

Legacy of the Ikshvaku Line

Sāgara ruled long and gloriously. His descendants include Asamanjas, Aṃśumān, Dilīpa, and finally Bhagīratha, who brought the Ganga down to earth for the salvation of Sāgara’s sixty-thousand sons.

The legend of Sāgara marks the pivot between mythic prehistory and epic lineage—a bridge between the earliest Solar Kings and the later House of Daśaratha from which Lord Rāma was born.

Sources:

Vālmīki Rāmāyaṇa, Bāla Kāṇḍa 1.69-77 – Genealogy of the Ikṣvāku line.

Vishṇu Purāṇa, IV.3-4 – Fall of Bahu (Bāhuka) and birth of Sāgara.

Brahmāṇḍa Purāṇa, Ch. 63 – Defeat of Haihayas and Tālajaṅghas.

Padma Purāṇa, Uttara Khaṇḍa – Aurva’s intervention and Sāgara’s naming.

Bhāgavata Purāṇa, IX.8 – Detailed summary of Bāhuka’s defeat and Sāgara’s exploits.

Harivaṃśa, 2.88-90 – Genealogical expansions and variant traditions.