While residing at the Ghosita Monastery near Kosambi, the Buddha spoke these verses with reference to Samavati, one of the chief queens of Udena, king of Kosambi.

There lived in the city of Bhaddavati a treasurer named Bhaddavatiya, and he was a friend of the treasurer Ghosaka, although Ghosaka had never seen him. Ghosaka had heard of Bhaddavatiya's wealth and age from traders, and desiring his friendship, sent him a present. Thus, although neither had seen the other, they dwelt as friends.

After a time, an intestinal disease broke out in the house of the treasurer Bhaddavatiya. When such a disease breaks out, the first to die are flies; afterwards, in regular order, insects, mice, domestic fowls, swine, cattle, slaves, and last of all the members of the household. Only those who break down the wall and flee save their lives.

The treasurer Bhaddavatiya and his wife and daughter fled in this manner, intending to seek the treasurer Ghosaka, and set out on the road to Kosambi. While they were still on their way, their provisions gave out, and their bodies became exhausted from exposure to wind and sun, and from hunger and thirst.

Reaching Kosambi with difficulty, they bathed in a pool of water in a pleasant place and then entered a rest house at the gate of the city.

The treasurer said to his wife, "Those who travel this way are not courteous even to a mother who has borne a child. Now I have a friend who, they say, dispenses a thousand pieces of money daily in alms to the blind, the poor, and other unfortunate persons. We will send our daughter there to bring us food, remain here for a day or two to refresh our bodies, and then go and see my friend." She agreed, and they took up residence in the rest house.

On the following day, when meal-time was announced, the parents sent their daughter to obtain food among the poor folk. Hiding her shame, she took a bowl and went. Asked how many portions she would have, she replied, "Three," and was given three portions, which she carried back to her parents.

The mother and daughter urged the treasurer to eat without worrying about them, since misfortune comes even to prominent families. After much urging he ate, but was unable to digest his food, and when the sun rose, he died. The mother and daughter wept and lamented.

The next day the girl went again for food, this time asking for two portions. She prevailed upon her mother to eat, but the mother too died that very day. Left alone, the girl wept and lamented over her misfortune.

On the following day, suffering the pangs of hunger, she went weeping among the beggars to procure food, and this time asked for only one portion.

A householder named Mitta, remembering that she had taken food for three days, rebuked her harshly, saying she had finally learned the capacity of her own belly. Wounded, she explained that she had not taken the food for herself: on the first day there had been three of them, the day before two, and now she was alone.

As he listened to her story, Mitta was overcome with grief and unable to hold back his tears. He told her not to worry, that from that day forward she would be his own daughter, and he kissed her on the head, brought her to his house, and adopted her as his eldest daughter.

One day she heard loud, piercing screams in the refectory where her foster-father dispensed alms, and asked him why he did not keep the people quiet. When he said it was impossible, she proposed building a fence around the refectory with two narrow gates, so that people would enter through one and leave through the other, receiving their alms peaceably. Mitta was delighted with the plan and carried it out, and from then on there was no more tumult in the refectory.

Up to that time her name had been Sama, but because of her fence she came to be called Samavati.

The treasurer Ghosaka had long been used to hearing the noise from the refectory and rather liked it, since it reminded him of his charitable work. After several days of silence, he asked Mitta why there was no more noise, and Mitta explained that his daughter had shown him how to arrange it peacefully.

Surprised to learn that Mitta had a daughter he had never seen, Ghosaka asked to hear the whole story, and Mitta told him everything, from the outbreak of the plague to his adoption of the girl. Ghosaka then declared that his friend's daughter was his own daughter too, sent for her, kissed her on the head, gave her five hundred women for her retinue, and adopted her as his own eldest daughter.

One day a festival was proclaimed in the city, and daughters of respectable families who did not ordinarily go out walked with their retinues to bathe in the river. Samavati went with her five hundred women through the palace court. King Udena, watching from his window, asked whose playful girls these were, and was told she was the daughter of the treasurer Bhaddavatiya, named Samavati. The king then brought Samavati and her retinue to the royal palace and made her his Queen Consort.

Another maiden, Magandiya, also became a chief consort of the king. She had once been rejected by the Buddha when her father sought him as a husband for her. Discovering that the other chief consort, Samavati, was an ardent follower of the Buddha, Magandiya resolved to take revenge on the Buddha and to harm Samavati and her maids.

Magandiya told the king that Samavati and her maids had made holes in the walls of their quarters and were being unfaithful to him. King Udena saw the holes but, once the matter was explained, did not grow angry.

Magandiya kept trying to convince the king that Samavati was plotting to kill him. Once she hid a snake inside a lute, covering the hole with flowers, and the snake came out hissing. Furious, the king made Samavati stand with her ladies lined up behind her, fitted his bow with a poisoned arrow, and shot it. But because Samavati and her ladies bore no ill will toward him, the power of their goodwill kept the arrow from striking. Realizing Samavati's innocence, the king gave her permission to invite the Buddha and his disciples to the palace for almsgiving and discourses.

Finding that none of her plots had worked, Magandiya made one final, ruthless plan: she sent word to her uncle to go to Samavati's palace and burn the building down with all the women inside. Samavati and her maids-of-honour, advanced in spiritual attainment, continued meditating even as the danger closed in, and all perished in the fire.

The king suspected Magandiya had instigated the fire but did not show it. Instead, he pretended to be pleased with her and promised to honour all her relatives with a great favour. When they arrived gladly at the palace, he had all of them, including Magandiya, seized and put to death in the courtyard.

When the Buddha was told of these events, he said that those who are mindful do not die, but those who are negligent are as good as dead even while living.