Kṛṣṇa’s supreme chest jewel. The familiar Purāṇic tradition has it emerge from the churning of the Ocean of Milk as an ornament of Viṣṇu; Rūpa Gosvāmī gives a Vraja account in which the wives of Kāliya present it to Kṛṣṇa when He enters the serpent’s lake. The two need not be opposed — līlā literature can describe an eternal divine object as received within a particular pastime.
