Colombo National Museum

This inscription is engraved on a fragment of an irregularly shaped octagonal stone slab, which appears from its shape to have originally formed a cross-bar of a railing. The fragment is now in the collection of the National Museum at Colombo. It was unearthed in 1893 by H. C. P. Bell in one of the buildings of the group called monastery L in the extensive monastic complex at Jetavanārāma in Anurādhapura. One end of the slab has broken off and is missing. As a result, the inscription is incomplete. The record can be dated on palaeographic grounds to the third or fourth century A.D. The first line tells us that it is an edict issued in the first year of a king’s reign but, unfortunately, the monarch’s name was inscribed on the lost portion of the slab. The fragmentary nature of the record prevents us from gaining a complete idea of the edict’s purpose but it seems to have been designed to regulate the ecclesiastical affairs of the ancient Sinhalese Buddhist Church. It addresses certain monks whose doctrines are described as needing regulation. These monks were apparently the inmates of some establishments known as the ‘Five Great Residences’. It appears that the king who issued this edict did so under outside influence, the inscription being engraved on a type of stone and using a form of script which were native to the Āndhra country and which are not typically found Sri Lanka. Senarath Paranavitana conjectured that the inscription may relate to the struggle between the monks of the Mahāvihāra and king Mahāsena (r. ca. 334–361), which is described in the chronicles. Paranavitana cited numerous pieces of evidence to support this theory (see Misc. Notes below) but, owing to the fragmentary nature of the edict, no decisive conclusion is possible.

This inscription is engraved on all four sides of a fragmentary stone pillar in the collection of the National Museum in Colombo. The provenance of the pillar has not been recorded. It appears to have been repurposed, sometime after it was originally inscribed and erected, as a riser in a flight of steps, resulting in the loss of some letters from the inscription. The text originally continued on the lower half of the pillar, which has been lost. The inscription can be dated on palaeographic grounds to the early tenth century. From the surviving portion of the text, it is clear that the record registered a grant of immunities by a king who had the viruda name of Abhā Salamevan and who is described as a brother of King Sirisaṅgbo Kasub (Sirisaṅghabodhi Kassapa). Senarath Paranavitana argues that the latter monarch is probably Kassapa IV, since he was the only monarch of the name who ruled in this period and had the viruda title Sirisaṅgbo. However, Kassapa IV is not known to have any younger brothers who succeeded him on the throne. Hence the identity of the Abhā Salamevan of the present inscription remains unclear.

The inscription is engraved on all four sides of a quadrangular stone pillar, currently in the stone gallery at the Colombo National Museum. The location where the pillar was found is not recorded. The pillar was broken into two pieces before it arrived at the museum. As a consequence, it was initially treated as two objects and the inscriptions on the fragments were recorded as distinct texts when eye-copies were produced for the Archaeological Survey of Ceylon in 1907 and 1924. However, the connection between the fragments was later recognised and the pieces were joined together. The inscription is dated on the tenth day of the first half of the month of Mändindina (February–March) in the eleventh year of Kassapa IV, referred to here by his biruda Kasub Sirisaṅgbo. Kassapa IV reigned between 898 and 914 A.D. The text records a grant of immunities to an estate which was an endowment of a lying-in-home founded by the Chief Secretary Senal (Sena).