[3] Bhikshtana is depicted as a nude four-armed man adorned with ornaments who holds a begging bowl in his hand and is followed by demonic attendants and love-sick women.

Another legend describes Bhikshatana's visit to the Deodar (Pine) Forest to dispense the ignorance of sages and lead them to true knowledge.

The Kurma Purana narrates that during a particular council of rishis (sages), the god Brahma arrogantly declared that he was the Supreme Creator of the Universe.

As a consequence Brahma died, but the spiritual credit he had accumulated over a lifetime of devout asceticism pulled him immediately back from death.

To expiate the sin of brahmahatya, Shiva had to perform the vow of a Kapali: wandering the world as a naked beggar with the skull of the slain as his begging bowl.

[5][6] In the Kurma and Vamana Puranas, Shiva's sin takes corporeal form, becoming a ghoulish woman called Brahmahatya who follows Bhikshatana everywhere he goes.

Vishaksena is resurrected and the sanctified Bhairava-Shiva, having bathed in the sacred pond in Varanasi, casts off the appearance of Bhikshatana and returns to his abode.

[5][6][10] As told in the Kurma Purana, Bhikshatana-Shiva wanted to reveal the ignorance of the sages, who were engrossed in Dharma (righteousness) and extreme austerities but had forgotten the Samkhya (Supreme Knowledge).

The naked, handsome, ithyphallic (with an erect phallus, urdhvalinga) beggar Shiva entered the forest, begging for alms from the sages' wives.

Eventually, he revealed his supreme form to the sages and exalted the Pashupata vow – by which a man restrains his passion, becomes celibate, and roams naked smeared with ash – declaring that such a lifestyle would lead to moksha (salvation).

Maddened by the death of his first wife Sati but chased by the love-god Kamadeva, Shiva escapes to the Deodar Forest and lives as a mendicant.

In another instance, while passing the Deodar Forest, Parvati notices sages who worship Shiva and have emaciated their bodies with fasts and severe vows.

[15] The Linga Purana also mentions the visit of Bhikshatana-Shiva to Deodar Forest to entice the wives of sages, who had taken up austerities "detrimental to the perpetuation of a healthy social order.

In retribution, Shiva casts a curse on the sages so that they, like Bhikshatana, will become beggars with matted hair and be devoid of knowledge.

When the sages regain their senses, they perform a black magic sacrifice, which produces a serpent, a lion, an elephant (or tiger), and a dwarf, all of which attack Shiva, who overpowers them.

[24] The ceiling of the Shivakamasundari shrine in the Nataraja temple complex illustrates this legend in a series of frescos, where Bhikshatana is depicted as a white naked mendicant accompanied by a scantily-scad Mohini.

[2][29] In contrast to textual descriptions, Orissan images of Bhikshatana depict him clothed with tiger skin and other body ornaments, but displaying an erect phallus.

His forehead bears a tripundara, the Shaiva tilaka composed of three horizontal lines of sacred ash with a red dot in the middle representing the third eye.

Snake ornaments adorn his body, and bronze images often depict multiple necklaces, a waist-band, armlets, elbow bands, bracelets, anklets, and rings on all his toes and fingers.

The front right arm is stretched out downwards and the hand holds a bit of grass or another plant in the kataka gesture, near the mouth of his pet deer or antelope, who leaps playfully by his side.

[33][34] One feature that does not appear in the canons but is often found in stone sculptures and bronzes is the presence of a small bell tied by a string just below the right knee.

The women, often seven in number,[36] are variously pictured as enamoured of Shiva, eager to embrace him, blessing him, or serving him food in his begging bowl with a ladle.

Shiva is often described as wandering the universe as a homeless beggar-ascetic with his consort Parvati's raison d'être being to bring him back to his marital and home life.

[29] In South Indian temples, Bhikshatana is prescribed to be enshrined as an avarana-devata (a deity depicted on the circumambulatory path encircling the central shrine).

However, unlike Nataraja, Bhikshatana is not related to specific temples, but has become "part of the mythological and festival-related traditions of all the major Tamil shrines".

[47] South Indian devotional literature portrays Bhikshatana in the Deodar Forest of the sages, but the Tevaram by the Nayanar poet-saints also describes rural women following him and calling out to him.

In a verse, Campantar rhetorically asks why the giver of all things and one who ends all troubles of devotees—Shiva—is wandering begging for food with a disgusting white skull.

In another verse a woman comments on his strange appearance and describes how she is frightened by the serpent that wraps around his body when she approaches to give him alms.

The women tell that the handsome beggar wearing tiger-skin and smeared with ash had come riding a white bull and holding an axe, and used a skull as his begging bowl.

He added that Bhikshatana would roam begging for food by day and dance at night in front of a fire, in company of his wife and several jackals.