JOURNAL 



OP 



THE ASIATIC SOCIETY. 



No. 69.— September, 1837. 



I. — An examination of the Pali Buddhistical Annals, No. 2. By the 

 Hon'ble George Turnour, Esq. Ceylon Civil Service. 



[Continued from page 527.] 



In the introductory remarks on the first convocation, submitted 

 in my preceding contribution, I have stated, collectively, all that I 

 purpose to offer, explanatory of the general history of the three 

 great buddhistical convocations, held in India, as deduced from 

 the data found in Buddhistical Pali Annals. I should have forwarded, 

 therefore, on the present occasion, the account of the second and 

 third convocations, without further comment, had it not furnished 

 two dates, recorded, both circumstantially and specifically, with 

 peculiar distinctness, which dates are pointedly at variance, in their 

 results, with the chronological evidence, afforded in European litera- 

 ture connected with that particular period of Asiatic history. 



The first of these dates is that of the second convocation, which, 

 as already stated, was held at the completion of the first century after 

 the death of Sakya, or before the birth of Christ 443 ; and the other, 

 that of the third convocation, which was held before Christ 308 in 

 the 17th year of Asoko's reign, falling respectively to the dates of 

 the Buddhistical era, 100 and 235. 



As it is between these two epochs that the invasion of India by 

 Alexander the Great, and the embassy of Megasthenes to the court 

 of Sandracottus at Palibothra, took place, which are considered to 

 constitute the earliest and the best authenticated links connecting 

 the histories of the west and the east, it is reasonable to expect that 

 European criticism will be, at once, and specially, directed to the exa- 

 mination of these particular portions of the Buddhistical annals, with 

 4 Y 



