The Sage Vashishtha lived here with his wife and the wish fulfilling cow, gifted to him by the Devas, after they obtained it from the churning of the ocean, with eight other jewels! He is credited to have brought Nandi Vardhan Mountain, the youngest son of Himalayas, to Mount Abu. The incredible flying snake, Arbud Naag, who brought the gargantuan mountain from the South on its back, demanded the mountain to be named after him as "Arbudanchal" for the recognition of his services in bringing the great mountain from the South to its present address.
As usual the British could not pronounce the tongue twister hence tarnished the glorious name to Abu. As the bard of Stratford on Avon would have commented, 'what is there in a name', the change of name to Abu could not diminish the grandeur of these mountains. Wonder of wonders is that in these ranges the Pine of Tundra and the Date Palm of desert amicably grow side by side. Being the oldest mountain ranges in the world they are the right candidate to be honored as the cradle of civilization. It is the place where Lord Rama came to have his schooling hence it is no doubt the Alma Mater of Lord Rama. It is the fountain head of the origin of one of the three sisters of Triveni, the Sarsawati, who meets her other two sisters, the Ganga and the Jamuna at Triveni at Allahabad, after travelling sub-terrain for a long distance.
It is authentically mentioned in Van Perva of Mahabharata, where Sage Ved Vyas sways Dharma Raj Udhishtar to spend one night at Vashishtha Ashram, and further enlightens that a night's stay at the Ashram would bless him with the blessing, equivalent to giving one thousand cows in charity.