Śrī Sūkta

She is addressed as the bestower of fame, bounty and abundance in the form of gold, cattle, horses and food; and is entreated to banish her sister Alakshmi (misfortune), who is associated with need, hunger, thirst, and poverty.

The hymn also associates Shri with (agrarian) fertility and she is described as the mother of kardama (mud), moist, perceptible through odour, and producing abundant harvest.

[2] The Shri Sukta uses the motifs of lotus (padma or kamala) and elephant (gaja) – symbols that are consistently linked with the goddess Shri-Lakshmi in later references.

The lotus is thought to be symbolic of purity, beauty, spiritual power, life, fertility, growth or, in Tantra, the entire created universe.

The elephants are symbolic of royalty and, in Hindu mythology, are also related with cloud and rain; they thus reinforce Shri-Lakshmi's stature as the goddess of abundance and fertility.