IN03217 Alavala-Amuna Rock Inscription

This inscription is engraved in larger and clear characters on a rock by the side of the stream known as Kospotu Oya, close to the dam at Alavaḷa in the Hēvāvisse Kōraḷē of the Kuruṇǟgala District. Its existence was recorded by Edward Müller in his Ancient Inscriptions in Ceylon (1883: 72, no. 171) but he provides neither the text nor the translation of the record. Müller also reported as fact an erroneous local legend that the text contained a grant to the nearby temple of Maedagama by king Parākramabāhu of Dambadeniya. In fact, the inscription registers the grant of extensive fields at Badalagoḍa to the Laṅkātilaka temple. Unfortunately, the name of the king who was responsible for the grant is no longer legible, due to the damaged condition of the first ten lines of the text. The lands affected by the grant lie close to the location of this epigraph and it was presumably inscribed here so that the local people, particularly the tenants, could be made aware of the fact. The same grant is recorded in two inscriptions – one in Sinhalese (IN03212) and one in Tamil (IN03214) – at the temple itself. However, the inscriptions at Laṅkātilaka refer to a much smaller extent of land at Badalagoḍa – only fourteen yāḷas, compared to the ninety yāḷas mentioned in the present inscription. This has led Senarath Paranavitana to conclude that the present inscription is somewhat later than those at the temple. As he suggests, the probability is that, after the publication of the temple inscriptions, more lands were brought under the plough below the Batalagoḍa tank and the income from these fields was also dedicated to the Laṅkātilaka temple.