The inscription is engraved on four sides of a quadrangular stone pillar, which was discovered by H. C. P. Bell in 1891 in the jungle close by the ruined dāgaba Kiribat-Vehera, about three and half miles to the north of Anurādhapura. This dāgaba is also called Menik Vehera or Gem dāgaba by local people. The inscription is written in Sinhalese alphabet from the 10th century A.D. Wickremasinghe assigns this record to a period immediately preceding Kassapa V’s reign. The inscription itself is dated in the fourteenth year of a king called Siri San̆go, an epithet often used by kings, but here probably referring to Kassapa IV, who arrived on the throne in 912 A.D. It was set up by a royal order in the presence of three officials, who are named as: Sabā-vaḍunnā Salayem, the bodyguard of the Pāṇḍyan king Dāpuḷa; (Ro)ṭu Pullayem; and Kiling Agbo. The inscription proclaims certain privileges or immunities attached to the dispensary at Bamuṇ-kumbara.

Epigraphia Zeylanica
Wickremasinghe, Don Martino de Zilva. (1904-12). ‘No. 11. Kiribat-Vehera Pillar-Inscription,’ Epigraphia Zeylanica 1, p. 161.

Whereas on the upōsatha day of the full moon of [the lunar month of] Väp [Sept-Oct.], in the fourteenth year [of his reign], His Majesty Siri San̆gbo declared [the following immunity], we, the three persons, Sabāvaḍunnā Salayem, body-guard of the Pāṇḍyan king Dāpuḷa, (Roṭu-)Pullayem and Kilin̆g Agbo [do hereby notify] that [the garden called] Upper Megiri-vatta which . . . the virtuous great king has granted to the dispensary at Bamuṇ-kumbara shall be bounded on the east by Veher-vatta, on the south by the Mī tree, on the west by the cart-road, and on the north by the Saṁbaḍä jungle; that the garden within these four boundaries shall not be entered by skilled servants of the royal family; that no allotments shall be taken; that no officials of the royal house holding two appointments shall enter [the garden]. Should any person enter after committing an offence, he shall be arrested only outside the precincts after the officials of the dispensary have been informed and [the offender] has been made to turn back, but no arrest shall be made by trespassing within the precincts.

 

[To this effect] this edictal pillar of immunity was proclaimed.

Other versions