Who is Satyavati?

The fisher girl

Satyavati grew up among fisher folk, ferrying travellers across the river. As a young woman she carried the smell of fish, and people called her Matsyagandha. One day she ferried the sage Parashara, and from their meeting a son was born on an island in the river: Krishna Dvaipayana, who would become Vyasa, the teller of the whole Mahabharata. The sage blessed her, and from then on she carried a wonderful fragrance instead.

The queen

King Shantanu, long after Ganga had left him, met Satyavati and fell in love. Her father set a condition: her children must inherit the throne. That condition led directly to Bhishma’s vow never to marry. Satyavati became queen, and her two sons with Shantanu became the heirs.

Holding the family together

Both of her sons died young and without children. Satyavati, now a widow and a grandmother without grandchildren, made a bold choice. She called on her firstborn son, Vyasa, to father children with the young widows of the royal house. From that came Dhritarashtra, Pandu and Vidura, and through them the Kauravas and the Pandavas.

So the woman who began on a ferry boat is the grandmother of both sides of the great war. When she saw the trouble already growing among her great-grandchildren, she left the palace and spent her last years in the forest.