1837.] Account of the Tooth relic of Ceylon. 859 



" Nawarni tassa wassamhi ddthddhdtummaTihino 



brdhmanikdchi dddya Kdlingamhd idhdnayi. 

 * Ddthddhdtussaivansamhi wuttena widhind : satan 

 gahetwd bahumdnena Jcatwd sammdnamuttuman, 

 Pakkhipitwd karandamhi wisuddhaphalikumbhawe, 



Dewdnanpiyatissena rdjawutthumhi kdrite, 

 Dhammachakkawhayt gehe waddhayittha mahipati : 

 tato patthdya tangehan Ddtfiddhdtugharan ahu. 1 ' 

 " In the ninth year of his (Sirime'ghawanno's) reign, a certain brahman 

 princess brought the Ddthddhdtu or tooth relic of Buddho, hither, from 

 Kdlinga, under the circumstances set forth in the Ddthddhdkawanso. The 

 monarch receiving charge of it himself, and rendering thereto, in the most 

 reverential manner, the highest honors, deposited it in a casket of great purity 

 made of " phalika" stone, and lodged it in the edifice called the Dhammachakko, 

 built by Dewananpiyatisso." 



This Daladdwansa compiled in the ancient Elu was translated 

 into Pali verse, during the first of the three short-lived reigns of the 

 queen of Ceylon, named Lilawati, who is as celebrated in the 

 history of the island, for the vicissitudes of her career, as for being 

 the widow of Parakkamo the first, the most martial and enterprizing 

 of all the monarches of Ceylon, subsequent at least to the Wijayan 

 dynasty. 



The translator of this work was Dhammarakkhito thero, and the 

 period embraced in Lilawati's first reign is from A. D. 1196 to 

 A. D. 1200; at the termination of which, she was deposed, for the 

 first time by Sahasamalla. 



The translator thus prefaces his translation of the Pali work; 

 to the analysis of which I shall presently apply myself. 



"As the compilers of the Chulawansof, in noticing the arrival of the tooth 

 relic (in Ceylon) have in a single gdthd only referred to the Daladdwansa 

 which had been composed in Elu verse, and stated that for the rest of the 

 particulars connected with the tooth relic, the Daladdwansa must be con- 

 sulted : as that Elu Daladdwansa is of inconvenient magnitude, comprising 

 the details contained in the Parinibbdna suttdn (of the P'dakattayan) and the 

 account of the transmission of the tooth relic to Kdlinga : as in those texts 

 it is found that at the demise of Buddho the the>o Khe'mo conveyed the 

 tooth relic to Kdlinga: as that Daladdwansa is both inconvenient in 

 size, and from its being composed in the obsolete Elu dialect, its meaning is 

 most difficult of comprehension to the Singhalese people : as the benefit resulting 

 both in this world and in the next, from listening to it, appears to be thereby 

 prejudiced; as both to the inhabitants of this island and of other lands on its 



* " Daladdwansa " the Elu denomination of the work would necessarily in the 

 Pdli be converted into " Ddthadhdtuwanso." 

 t The passage above quoted. 



