Person: K. Kanapathi Pillai

This inscription is engraved on a stone slab, which was discovered in the village of Mānkanai in the Trincomalee town. The slab is now kept in the Archaeological Museum at Anuradhapura. The inscription is in two parts, each comprising of twenty-two lines of writing incised between parallel lines. The purpose of the record is to register the donation for life of certain paddy lanks to one Mintaṉ Koṟṟaṉ, the overseer of the palanquin bearers of the palace. The donation was made by king Gajabhāhu II (r. 1131–1153 A.D.) but it is dated in the forty-third regnal year of his predecessor Jayabhāhu I (r. 1108–1145/6 A.D.) and was inscribed on stone by a local ruler in the Southern Country called Māṉāparaṇa. The practice of dating an inscription from the coronation of a dead king is known from inscriptions. Since Jayabhāhu I took the throne in 1108, the present inscription may be dated to 1150–1151.

This inscription was discovered by the Archaeological Commissioner, Senarath Paranavitana, in 1951 at Paṇḍuvasnuvara, otherwise called Parākramapura, which was the capital of the Principality of Dakkhiṇa-deśa for a time during the medieval period. Paṇḍuvasnuvara is situated in the Girātalana Korale of the Devamädi Hatpattu in the Kurunǟgala District, some twenty-two miles from Chilaw on the Wariyapola road. The inscription is engraved on a stone slab, which was found at an ancient site to the south of the Citadel. Its discovery is mentioned in the Archaeological Survey of Ceylon Annual Report for 1951 (p. 6). The record is dated in the fifth year of the Kalinga ruler Niśśaṅka Malla, who is here given the biruda Parākramabāhu. Since this ruler ascended to the throne in 1187 A.D., the date of the inscription is to be placed in the year 1191 A.D. or 1192 A.D. This dating is confirmed by the astronomical data given in the inscription. On the basis of this data, the equivalent date of the record would be either Thursday 7 January 1188 or Thursday 3 January 1191, the second of which does indeed fall in the fifth year of Niśśaṅka Malla. The purpose of the inscription is to record the benevolent deeds of a military general called Matimāṉapañacara alias Kulaṉtey. This general can be identified with Lak Vijayasinha, who is mentioned in the slab inscriptions of Niśśaṅka Malla at Polonnaruva.