Duryodhana: The Mace and the Dice
Eldest of the hundred. Named Suyodhana at birth. Kali in a prince. The mace is his.
Also called Suyodhana · Duryodhan
Who Duryodhana is
Duryodhana is the eldest of Gandhari’s hundred, named Suyodhana at birth and remembered as Duryodhana. The recitation calls him Kali in a prince. The mace is his; Balarama taught it to him and to Bhima both.
He cannot bear the Pandavas in one house. The lac mansion, the dice, the sabha, and the refusal of five villages are his road to Kurukshetra. He dies on the eighteenth day by the lake, the thigh broken, while his teacher will not watch.
Names and spellings
Canonical name in this graph: Duryodhana. Common Mahabharat spellings and titles stay in the aliases rather than being repeated in every heading.
Parents
Children
In the recitation
Narrative role
Adi Parva — childhood He poisons Bhima and puts him in the Ganga. Bhima comes back heavier. The house does not become quieter.
The tournament He embraces Karna when the court asks for a lineage. Anga is the gift that makes a friend into a king.
Sabha Parva Shakuni plays for him. Draupadi is dragged. He slaps his thigh. She vows it.
Shalya Parva — day 18 The army is gone. He hides in a lake. Bhima breaks the thigh. Balarama, who taught both men, calls it crooked and leaves.
How Duryodhana is related
How is Duryodhana related to Karna? The friendship that holds when blood will not. Anga, the sabha, the two days Karna commands — they stand together. Karna
How is Duryodhana related to Yudhishthira? Cousins who cannot share a kingdom. The dice are the legal-looking way to take what a war will later take again. Yudhishthira
How is Duryodhana related to Bhima? Poison in childhood; the mace at the end. Draupadi’s vow on the thigh is the sentence Bhima carries out. Bhima
How is Duryodhana related to Shakuni? Maternal uncle and the hand that throws. The dice are Shakuni’s; the hunger is Duryodhana’s. Shakuni
Source notes
Mahabharata text (Adi, Sabha, Shalya), Ganguli. ‘Kali in a prince’ is the epic’s own incarnation note, not a later moral. Last reviewed 12 September 2026.
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