NO. 40. — 1890.] KURUNEGALA ROCKS. 



383 



residence in the district, but after his departure it fell into 

 disrepair and ultimately into ruin. 



There are the remains of a wall built across a hollow 

 blocking up a path — another approach to the summit — and 

 evidently intended in former times to prevent access to it. 



The KurunegalaVistaraya (an interesting topographical 

 account of the city of Hastisailapura, said to have been 

 written by Pusbadewa Terunnanse, probably during the 

 period when Kurunegala was the seat of Government, in the 

 thirteenth and fourteenth centuries) states that " on the 

 rock where the Sun god is worshipped there are four parapet 

 walls surrounding it." It does not say on which particular 

 rock, but one may fairly presume it to be the principal one, 

 namely, Eta-gala. It further records that four palaces stand 

 on the rock, and below it four parapet walls. For the pro- 

 tection of the city there is an embankment (dddra bemma) 

 or rampart. About a hundred large bows' distance from the 

 sleeping palace of the king (Setapena Mdligdiva), the situa- 

 tion of which is given as twelve fathoms from " Beetle rock " 

 (Kuruminiyd-gala), is the Dalada Maligawa. On the east 

 of it, at nine fathoms distance, stands the Nata Dewalaya. 

 In a pit excavated in the rock, four cubits deep, lie buried 

 21,000 masuran, or pieces of gold coin, with a relic of 

 Buddha of the size of a grain of undti. On the opposite 

 bank of the stream stands the Maha Dewalaya (probably 

 dedicated to Saman)* ; on the west, at a distance of sixty 

 fathoms, the Nata Dewalaya ; sixty fathoms therefrom the 

 Pattini Dewalaya ; and eighty fathoms away the Kattaragama 

 Dewalaya. 



According to the Mahdwansa, King Parakrama Bahu II., 

 son of Vijaya Bahu III., and called Kalikala Sahitya Sab- 

 banfiu Pandita, " the all-knowing pandit of the Kaliyuga era 

 of literature," who reigned in Hastisailapura (Kurunegala) 

 from 1240 A.D. to 1275 A.D., caused his brother Bhuvaneka 

 Bahu, the sub-king, to build a large vihare in the noble city 



* Rather to Vishnu. — B.. Hon, Sec. 



