(Naags and Nagin's are shapeshifters that transition between human forms and a cobra- image provided by - Wikimedia Commons)
When I started looking into what I wanted to write about, I was super intrigued by the story of naags and nagins. This is a topic not found in American literature (or at least I can't find anything) so I thought it would be interesting to explore this but try to add a twist to the tail! I want to add a "Twilight"-esc twist to the tail. Dr. Gibbs sent me some amazing resources to look at so I'm thinking maybe combining a few stories, but keeping the basic storyline of "Twilight".
The first article I wanted to look up was to analyze the history of naags and nagins. I found a great Wikipedia article about the background of these creatures. They are actually referred to as Ichchadhari Naags which means they shape-shifting Cobras. Interesting, not just any snake but a cobra! So unlike a vampire (who converts humans) in Indian mythology, a cobra can become an Ichchadhari Naag after 100 years of Tapasya (penance). Then, if it gets blessed by Lord Shiva, they can take the form of any living creature (so not just humans). They can also live for more than hundreds of years without getting old (like vampires!).
Now that I have a basic history of these creatures, I wanted to look into some specific stories. The first story I looked at was Takshaka. I think its interesting to first point out that Takshaka is also mentioned in Chinese and Japanese mythology as being one of the Eight Great Dragon Kings. I think it is so fascinating that there is a cross-cultural connection with this character! So Takshaka is known as the kings of the Naags and a descendent of Shri Rama. He was kicked out of his kingdom but sought revenge by killing the Kings' son with a snake bit. But then there was a bigger fight and he was expelled from there. After a lot of back and forth, Takshaka stopped the massacre of the Naags and ended all the enmity with them.
In the last story, I wanted to look at was that of Ulupi. Ulupi is the daughter of Kauravya, one of the kings of the naags and the second wife of Arjuna. Her main story revolved are Arjuna because Arjuna is a human prince and Ulupi was a nagin. The basic story is that Ulupi falls in love with Arjuna and convinces him to marry her while Arjuna is in exile. They have a son born to them. Later Arjuna is cursed but after fights and turmoils, Ulupi used a Nāgamaṇi (naag gem) to bring Arjuna back to live and restore peace.
Wouldn't it be interesting if I combined Takshaka and Ulupi's story into one and made them fall in love with each! haha, that would be very different from their original stories.
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