Yaśodharā
(b. c. 563 BC; d. c. 485 BC, traditional; wife of the Buddha)
BIRTH
Around 563 BC (traditional)
PLACE
Devdaha, Nepal
DEATH
Around 485 BC (traditional)
PLACE
India
FAMILY
HOMES
RELIGIOUS VIEWS
BUDDHIST
EARLY BUDDHIST SANGHA (TRADITIONAL ACCOUNT)
MEMBERSHIPS
BUDDHIST NUNS’ SANGHA MEMBER
AWARDS
Yasodhara is the name given in Buddhist tradition to Siddhartha Gautama’s wife and the mother of Rahula. Later narratives explore her response to his departure and portray her eventual entry into the Buddhist community as a nun who attained enlightenment. Her story shaped devotional literature and folk memory. Texts use differing names and sometimes distinguish multiple wives, so a single detailed biography and the traditional dates cannot be independently verified.
EARLY LIFE
According to Buddhist tradition, Yasodhara was the daughter of Suppabuddha, a chief of the Koliya clan, and Amita, a sister of Siddhartha’s father, Suddhodana; some texts name her mother differently. Around 563 BC is a traditional birth estimate based on accounts that she was born on the same day as Siddhartha. Their absolute chronology is disputed. She lived in the Himalayan foothills, in what is now southern Nepal and northern India, and traditionally married Siddhartha at sixteen.
According to Buddhist texts, Yasodhara and Siddhartha lived in luxury at the palace in Kapilavastu. Their son, Rahula, was born around the time Siddhartha left the palace to seek enlightenment.
After Siddhartha left, Yasodhara lived simply, wearing plain robes and eating one meal a day, in sympathy with his ascetic life. When the Buddha returned to Kapilavastu years later, she sent Rahula to ask for his inheritance, and the boy became a novice monk.
When the Buddha's stepmother, Mahapajapati, founded the order of nuns, Yasodhara joined it. According to tradition, she attained enlightenment as an arhat and died at the age of seventy-eight, two years before the Buddha.
CAREER
DEATH
Yasodhara is the name given in Buddhist tradition to Siddhartha Gautama’s wife and the mother of Rahula. Later narratives explore her response to his departure and portray her eventual entry into the Buddhist community as a nun who attained enlightenment. Texts use differing names and sometimes distinguish multiple wives, so a single detailed biography and the traditional dates cannot be independently verified. According to Buddhist texts, Yasodhara and Siddhartha lived in luxury at the palace in Kapilavastu. After Siddhartha left, Yasodhara lived simply, wearing plain robes and eating one meal a day, in sympathy with his ascetic life. When the Buddha returned to Kapilavastu years later, she sent Rahula to ask for his inheritance, and the boy became a novice monk. When the Buddha's stepmother, Mahapajapati, founded the order of nuns, Yasodhara joined it. Yasodhara's death is placed at Around 485 BC (traditional), associated with India, but the chronology remains approximate or disputed. The available biographical account does not describe a continuous final medical course. It gives no dependable sequence of treatment and last symptoms from which to reconstruct a more detailed bedside narrative.
POPULAR BIOGRAPHIES
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