82 
JOURNAL, R.A.S. (CEYLON). [VoL. XXII. 
from the campanile, &c. The images may be as old, but can 
be no older. 
Now on the stones of the campanile letters are to be found 
lightly traced by the point of a chisel. There is only one on 
any given stone, and in all I discovered nine of them cut, 
evidently to help the builder in placing the stones correctly. 
^ <^ 3 en 
SINGLE LETTERS ON STONES OF THE " POT-GTJLA." 
From their form the letters can be at once, and with 
certainty, ascribed to the latter half of the eleventh or to the 
twelfth century a.d. So that Mr. Bell's estimate* is entirely 
supported by first-rate evidence. And it may be assumed 
that these huge images, which in their style and colossal 
proportions so nearly resemble those at the " Gal-vihdre'^ in 
Polonnaruwa, were commenced by Parakrama Bahu I., or 
at least in his reign. And perhaps in the raid of Kalinga 
Magha, which followed soon after, they were abandoned, and 
Tantri-malai left to grow up in forest and to become a home 
of buffaloes and bears. 
It is satisfactory to have archaeological evidence regarding 
the date of these great stone figures; but even without it I 
think it would have been obvious that they could not belong 
to the simple times of early Buddhism. The idea of huge 
images was not entertained until several centuries after 
Christ. They in their way are fine, but it is not the way of the 
simple monks who lived in tlie early cave monasteries. 
Before leaving this side of the archaeology of Tantri-malai, 
it may be added that I found nothing to support Mr. Parker's 
* " They manifestly belong to much the same period of lithic 
sculptured art as the five examples at Polonnaruwa " — Annual Report^ 
A. S., 1891, p. 8. 
