6 JoM-nal of tlie Asiatic Society of Bengal. [January, 1907. 



in Ceylon and elsewhere. Mr. Fleet lias even anticipated my pres^^ 

 ent suggestion and rejected it for tlie reason just stated. He 

 says (p. 17) that he can detect nothing to indicate that Buddha's 

 first appearance as a teacher at the age of thirty-five (according 

 to tradition) was ever employed in Buddhist chronology, though 

 he is prepared to admit that it would be much more likely to have 

 served as an epoch-making event than the ahhimskramnna, or 

 depai'ture from home, at the age of twenty-nine, to which Profes- 

 sor Rhys Davids called attention as the event alluded to in the 

 records under discussion. I must reply to the objection in as few 

 words as possible. Asoka's ideas of chronology are unknown to 

 us. We are dealing merely with probabilities. Are my points 

 such in number and in circumstance as to warrant a probable 

 conclusion in regard to Asoka s mode of dating his docu- 

 ments ? _ 



In the third place, then, attention must be drawn to two 



special features in the edict at Rupnath, Sahasram and Brahma- 

 giri. It is the only edict that contains any numerical indication of 

 the kind 256. It is the only edict in which Asoka mentions 

 events in his life without dating them in regnal years. This 

 second peculiarity has, I believe, escaped the notice of scholars. 

 Elsewhere Asoka invariably dates these events from the year of 

 his coronation (abhi§eka) ; and, to leave no doubt as to the point, 

 of reckoning, he uses the words ahhisita ahhzsitena^ etc. Looking 

 then to his invariable practice in this respect, we can hardly 

 suppose that the omission of any reference to the regnal year, in 

 the case of an edict which exists in several recensions and records 

 important events in Asoka's life, is a matter of pure accident. 

 On the other hand, if the R.-S.-B. edict is exceptional as being 

 the only one that leaves us in doubt as to whether events recorded 

 in it took place before or after the coronation, we may suppose, if 

 not stopped by clear proof to the contrary, that the edict was 

 issued in the coronation year and recorded events in Asoka's life 

 prior to that great occasion: we may even indulge in the conjec- 

 ture that the numerical expression 256 served the definite purpose 

 of recording the coronation in years to be reckoned (as our preced- 

 ing paragraph suggested) irom the year of the great Illumina- 

 tion, And we may round oH the argument by explaining that 

 only a single announcement of this date 256 is made, because sub- 

 sequent indications in regnal years would be sufficient. Of 

 course, I assume among other things that Asoka desired to assign 

 a date to what woiild thus be his First Edict. But even so, I can- 

 not pretend to know why he should prefer to reckon from the 

 Illumination rather than from the Death of the Buddha. I might 

 say— if here it has pleased Asoka to associate his own solemn 



con- 



secration as king with the first year of the Buddha's ministry, the 

 spirit is akin to that regal piety which at Bhabra published an 

 official summary of the Good Law for use in the churches. And 

 more might b© said along these vague a priori lines. 



But it is time to deal with figures. I don't mean to enter on 

 that terrible question of the date of Buddha's death, I can prove 



