This is the first volume of a projected three-volume work on the little-known South Indian folk cult of the goddess Draupadi and on the classical epic, the Mahabharata , that the cult brings to life in mythic, ritual, and dramatic forms. Draupadi, the chief heroine of the Sanskrit Mahabharata , takes on many unexpected guises in her Tamil cult, but her dimensions as a folk goddess remain rooted in a rich interpretive vision of the great epic. By examining the ways that the cult of Draupadi commingles traditions about the goddess and the epic, Alf Hiltebeitel shows the cult to be singularly representative of the inner tensions and working dynamics of popular devotional Hinduism. Alf Hiltebeitel is a professor of religion and director of the Human Sciences Program at The George Washington University. He is the author or editor of numerous books including the two-volume Cult of Draupadi and Rethinking India’s Oral and Classical Epics , both published by the University of Chicago Press.