Nakshatra 3 of 27
Krittikaకృత్తిక
The cutting flame — purification that does not flatter.
- Ruling planet
- Sun
- Deity
- Agni, the fire
- Symbol
- A razor, a flame, an axe
- Gana
- Rakshasa (fierce)
- Nature
- Mishra — mixed
- Sidereal span
- Mesha 26° 40′ – Vrishabha 10° 00′
About Krittika
Krittika is the Pleiades, and its deity is Agni. Fire in this tradition is not merely destructive: it is the agent that separates what is true from what is not, which is why Krittika's symbol is a blade. It is the nakshatra of the sharp eye and the sharp tongue, of criticism that is accurate, and of cooking — the domestic form of the same transformative fire. Kartikeya, the war-god, is said to have been nursed by its six stars, and something of that martial edge stays with it.
What it traditionally favours
Anything involving fire or heat, cooking, cutting, surgery, and honest appraisal. Suited to purificatory rites and to work that needs finishing decisively.
The four padas
Every nakshatra is divided into four quarters called padas, each three degrees twenty minutes wide. The pada refines the reading: two people born under the same nakshatra but in different padas are held to differ meaningfully, because each pada falls in a different navamsa and so carries a different sub-influence.
The pada also decides the first syllable of a child's name. Where the moon stood at birth gives the nakshatra; which quarter of it gives the syllable. The four syllables below are in pada order — a child born in the first pada takes the first, and so on. This is the naming convention used at namakaranam across most of southern India.
- 1A26° 40′ →
- 2I30° 00′ →
- 3U33° 20′ →
- 4E36° 40′ →