JOURNAL 



or 



THE CEYLON BRANCH 



OF THE 



ROYAL ASIATIC SOCIETY. 



NOTES ON ANCIENT SIMHALESE INSCRIPTIONS, 

 Br P. GOLDSCHMIDT, Ph. D. 



I propose, in the following pages, to give an analysis of 

 all the forms of words contained in the inscriptions (or 

 extracts from such) translated and rendered into Eng- 

 lish in my last report to the Ceylon Government (September, 

 1876.) I have not, as a rule, attempted here to deal at 

 any length with phonetical or grammatical laws which 

 occasion required to touch upon, as I hope, ere long, to be 

 able to publish some general results of an historical survey 

 of the Simhalese language. 



I have also omitted the six published lines of the long 

 inscription of Parakramabahu I. at Polonnaruwa (Report 

 p. 11, 12), as the whole or at least a considerable portion of 

 it "will be printed the next time, for which work I am 

 now specially prepared by the discovery of an interesting 

 manuscript containing a katikdwata or religious ordinance of 

 Parakramabahu identical with the first part of our inscrip- 

 tion, which has been communicated to me through the 

 courtesy of the learned Mudaliyar L. de Zoysa. 

 J" 



