SARASVATĪ is a goddess of pan-Indian importance best known as the patron of learning and the fine arts. Her name means "flowing, watery," and indeed, she first appears in the Ṛgveda as a sacred river. Since Ṛgvedic times Sarasvatī has been associated with knowledge and learning, and quite early she developed a special connection with music, as is shown iconographically by the lute (vīṇā) that she often holds. In texts beginning with the Yajurveda she is identified with Vāc, a female personification of sacred speech.

Sarasvatī's primary mythic association is as the wife (or sometimes the daughter) of the god Brahmā; as his cult waned, she came increasingly to be represented, along with Lakṣmī, as a spouse of Viṣṇu. Although she has been assimilated in this way to various deities of the Brahmanic tradition, her primary religious importance is as...