Introduction
Amitodana was a brother of Suddhodana within the Shakya clan, named in some Buddhist sources as father of the Buddha's cousins Ananda and Anuruddha.
Family
- Father: Sihahanu
- Mother: Kaccana
- Children: Ananda, Anuruddha
- Siblings: Dhotodana, Suddhodana, Sukkodana
An Uncertain Attribution, Recorded as Such
Accounts vary on the exact assignment of sons among Suddhodana's several brothers: some sources name Amitodana as father of Ananda, others attribute Ananda instead to Sukkodana. This record follows the more commonly cited attribution (Amitodana as father of both Ananda and Anuruddha) while explicitly noting the disagreement rather than presenting it as settled fact.
This article follows the Pali Canon and its commentarial tradition as the primary early Buddhist textual source; where sources genuinely disagree on a detail (such as an exact parentage), that disagreement is noted rather than resolved into a single invented certainty.