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Matted hair: Shiva's distinctive hair style is noted in the epithets Jaá¹­in, 'the one with matted hair', and Kapardin, 'endowed with matted hair' or 'wearing his hair wound in a braid in a shell-like (kaparda) fashion'.The ashes represent a reminder that all of material existence is impermanent, comes to an end becoming ash, and the pursuit of eternal soul and spiritual liberation is important. Ashes: Shiva iconography shows his body covered with ashes (bhasma, vibhuti).

The origin of this linkage may be due to the identification of the moon with Soma, and there is a hymn in the Rig Veda where Soma and Rudra are jointly implored, and in later literature, Soma and Rudra came to be identified with one another, as were Soma and the moon. The placement of the moon on his head as a standard iconographic feature dates to the period when Rudra rose to prominence and became the major deity Rudra-Shiva. The epithet Candraśekhara (Sanskrit: चन्द्रशेखर 'Having the moon as his crest' – candra = 'moon' śekhara = 'crest, crown') refers to this feature. Crescent moon: Shiva bears on his head the crescent moon.Other related translations have been based on the idea that the name actually refers to the oblations given to Rudra, which according to some traditions were shared with the goddess Ambikā. These three mother-goddesses who are collectively called the Ambikās. However, in Vedic Sanskrit, the word ambā or ambikā means 'mother', and this early meaning of the word is the basis for the translation 'three mothers'.

In classical Sanskrit, the word ambaka denotes 'an eye', and in the Mahabharata, Shiva is depicted as three-eyed, so this name is sometimes translated as 'having three eyes'.