THE BIRTH IN LUMBINI PARK

About ten months after the dream, the Queen was expecting her child and so she went to the King and said "My dear, I have to go back to my parents. My baby is about due now." Since it was the custom in India, for a wife to have her baby in her father's house, the King agreed saying "Very well, I will be making the necessary arrangements for you to go."

The king then send soldiers ahead to clear the road and some were retained to guard the Queen as she was carried in a decorated palanquin. The Queen left Kapilavatthu in a long procession of soldiers and retainers, for the capital of her father's kingdom.

On the way to the Koliya country, they passed a garden called Lumbini Park. This garden was near the kingdom called Nepal, at the foot of the Himalayan Mountains. At that time, the park was full of sweet scented flowers growing on the Sala trees and thousands of birds, bees and other insects had flocked to the trees.