ḍākinī (Sanskrit; Tib., mkha‘-’gro-ma). In tantric Buddhism, a ḍākinī is a type of accomplished yoginī or else a female deity, depicted iconographically as a naked semi-wrathful figure who acts as a guiding intermediary for practitioners and assists in the actualization of siddhis. First noted in Indian sources around the 4th century ce, ḍākinīs were probably tribal shamanesses in origin and their name can be linked to cognate terms meaning ‘summoning’ and ‘drumming’ rather than ‘flying’ as suggested by the Tibetan translation which means ‘sky-goer’.

A Dictionary of Buddhism, Oxford University Press, 2003, 2004 (which is available in electronic version from answer.com)

ḍākinī f. (of ○ka Pāṇ. 4-2, 51 Pat.) a female imp attending Kālī (feeding on human flesh) BhP.x BrahmaP. MārkP. Kathās. (ḍāginī, cī, cviii f.) (cf. śāk○)

• N. of a locality ŚivaP. i, 38, 18

Sanskrit-English Dictionary, by M. Monier William