Mahapajapati Gotami

Mahāprajāpatī Gautamī was the maternal aunt of Siddhartha Gautama, his mother's sister, and raised him after his mother's death. When the Buddha began teaching, she sought something unprecedented: ordination for women. She approached him directly with the request. He granted it, and she became the first bhikṣuṇī in Buddhist tradition — the first woman to take monastic vows in the sangha. Her persistence opened a path that had not existed before.