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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 March 2011
The Mānāvuḷu - sandesaya, or in Pali Mahānāgakula - sandesa, which to-day first reaches the Western reader, is a little Pali poem of somewhat singular character. It is in the form of a poetical epistle, in the style of high kāvya. It is dated from Mahānāgakula (Mānāvuḷu), a city of Ceylon. After long and occasionally complicated panegyrics upon this city, a local Buddhist monastery, and the mahāthera Nāgasena residing in the latter, it proceeds to describe in similar strains the city of Arimaddanapura (Pugāma, the modern Pagan), the emperor Siri-Dhammarāja who bears rule therein, a monastery built by the latter near his capital, and a distinguished mahāthera named Kassapa - Saṅgha - rakkhita who dwells there. Then follows an address from Nāgasena to Kassapa, in which Nāgasena mentions that he has received a letter from Kassapa through a minister Ñāṇa, apparently containing a request. The poem here practically comes to an end. Five verses follow, containing greetings to a certain Sāriputta and an exhortation to reform the Church in Pagan as it had been reformed in Ceylon by Parākrama-bāhu; but as these verses are in part grossly corrupt, as they are singularly feeble and debased in style, and as they are ignored by the Sinhalese translator of the rest of the poem, we are justified in regarding them with suspicion. Either they are altogether spurious, or they are a rough draft which the poet never worked out. The poem is thus a mere fragment.
page 266 note 1 See also Mahāvaṃsa, Ixxx, 6 f.
page 267 note 1 Inscriptions of Pagan, Pinya, and Ava (Rangoon, 1892), x, No. 15, p. 243.Google Scholar
page 267 note 2 Inscriptions of Pagan, etc., iv, No. 3, p. 117, and vii, No. 16, p. 184.
page 267 note 3 Inscriptions of Pagan, etc., iii, No. 6, p. 101.
page 267 note 4 Inscriptions of Pagan, etc., vii, No. 14, p. 181.
page 267 note 5 See Forchhammer, The Jardine Prize, pp. 29 ff.
page 267 note 6 Mahāvaṃsa, lxi, 23 ; lxxii, 118 ff.; lxxv, 21.
page 269 note 1 Ab, Bb, Cb -ācitamhā; Aa, Ba, Ca, D -ocitamhā.
page 269 note 2 Aa, Ba, Ca, D -nīrajāpa-; Ab, Bb, Cb -nīrajapa-.
page 269 note 3 A, C sūnibhi.
page 269 note 4 Aa, Ca -ādol-; Ba, D -andol-; Ab, Bb, Cb -āndol-.
page 269 note 5 A, C kuñj-; B, D kūj-.
page 269 note 6 C kadalavināvali.
page 269 note 7 A, C, D -ārambhite.
page 269 note 8 After thero A adds ṇaro, C naro.
page 270 note 1 Aa, Ca -nālaṃ.
page 270 note 2 So B, D, Aa, Ca ; Ab, Cb -tulite (or -tuline).
page 270 note 3 Should we read -dā ?
page 270 note 4 A, B, C -bhāvo (D -bhānavo); but the Sinh., which explains “ like the moon's rays ” (candra-marīcīn menda), confirms our emendation.
page 270 note 5 A, B, C, D candanandavā.
page 270 note 6 Should we read dum- ?
page 270 note 7 Aa, Caparisayan-; Ab, Cbparissayan-; the latter may be right.
page 270 note 8 Sonā- Aa (originally, but corrected), Ca, D.
page 270 note 9 Hilādayo A (originally, but corrected), C, D.
page 271 note 1 Aa -ādhi-, corrected to -ādi-; Ab, B, D -ādi-; C -ādhi-.
page 271 note 2 Dosāra- A, C (in Aa orig. dosāri-); sodāri- D.
page 271 note 3 A, B, C, D -tanuyā.
page 271 note 4 A, B, C aḍḍho … bhūmibhedābhisaṅko (D aḍḍho … -saṅke); the emendation is confirmed by the Sinh.
page 271 note 5 I.e. in Sanskrit dig-avaguṇṭhitām. Cb has -tā, Ab -to altered to -taṃ, D -to.
page 271 note 6 B, D nindita.
page 271 note 7 A, B, C, D hāriṇi or -ni; but the Sinh. treats the word as epithet of -yasaṃ, which must be a feminine, as apparently in v. 49.
page 272 note 1 A, B, C, D -pādā.
page 272 note 2 Only Aa, Ca -dā; D -de.
page 272 note 3 B -rañja-.
page 272 note 4 A, C -pīṭhe.
page 272 note 5 Ba, D duṭṭh-.
page 272 note 6 A, B, C, D jhatvāmāri-, dividing jhatvāma ari- ; the Sinh. also suggests jhatvāna.
page 272 note 7 A(?), B, Ca, D samino; Cbsamito.
page 272 note 8 C, D duddhāra- ; but A, B, and the Sinh. confirm our reading.
page 272 note 9 Aa, Casantenāri- ; Ba, D yan tenapi-.
page 272 note 10 B ambha- ; the Sinh. translates “mass of clouds.”
page 272 note 11 Should we read disā dasûbhippasaranti ?
page 273 note 1 A, B, C, D -tndarā-. In the next line only Bb has akāri. A, Ba, C, D akāsi, which may possibly be right, supposing the poet's grammar to be vitiated by the vernacular (the Sinh. has here keḷēyi, both active and passive).
page 273 note 2 B, Cb -parikkhitta-, and so apparently the Sinh.
page 273 note 3 A -parimanthana- ; C -paramanthana- ; B, D -paripanthana-.
page 273 note 4 A, B, C, D nikhiḍā.
page 273 note 5 Corrupt. A, Bb, C, D agree in reading mace- (Bamaṇḍ-), and the Sinh. construes it as if it were acc- (i.e. aty-) !
page 273 note 6 A, B, C, D m ; the Sinh. suggests c’.
page 273 note 7 A, B, C virasāpatāpahā (D,-tāpavābhā); the Sinh. has “allaying unpleasant heat.”
page 273 note 8 Batapanopavanod-, Bbtapavanod-, D tapavanopavadāra-.
page 273 note 9 B, D -kaṇṇu- ; A, C -kannu-.
page 273 note 10 Aa, Cayāsā- ; Ab, Cbyasa- ; B, D yasā-.
page 274 note 1 C brū-, D bra-.
page 274 note 2 C -ghina-.
page 274 note 3 Ab, Ba -karaṇo ; Aa, Ca -karano.
page 274 note 4 A, B, C, D -pādāmihitaṃ (Ba twice hitaṃ).
page 274 note 5 A, B, C, D samaggi- ; the Sinh. siyaḷu, “all.”
page 274 note 6 Versea 58–62 are for the most part incorrigibly corrupt, and probably spurious.
page 274 note 7 A (?), C bheti.
page 274 note 8 A, B, C, D sammād-.
page 274 note 9 B pariṇāy-; D parinay- ; A, C pariṇāmay-.
page 274 note 10 B tvanirāmayattha, C tvaromayatvā, A dādāmi. D omits all.
page 274 note 11 So apparently A, C ; A, however, has saṃsāgame (?), and C -raṇam. B has jīvitaṃ saṃsajjam idaṃ kuo sulabhaṃ, D jīvitam soyāgamena … sulabhaṃ patirājāti jīvitaṃ mayaṃ.
page 275 note 1 A, B, C ye ye ; D yo ye.
page 275 note 2 D tehaṃ.
page 275 note 3 A, C nameva; D tam eva.
page 275 note 4 These words are found only in D.
page 275 note 5 Sinhalese poets are fond of comparing a city to the jewelled face of the Earth or of Lankā ; so in the Anurādhapura-vistaraya—
Anurādhapuraṃ raramaṃ āsi laṅkāmahītale
bhūmikāminiyā sādhu maṇḍitaṃ vadanaṃ viya.
page 275 note 6 Cf. Buddhacarita, viii, 37.
page 275 note 7 Guṇa = ‘ pistil’ and ‘ virtue.’ The point is strengthened by nīraja, which suggests nis-rajas.
page 276 note 1 The same metaphor as in Attana-galu-vaṃśa, i, 7.
page 276 note 2 The point lies in the double meaning of jhāyanti, signifying both ‘ are burnt’ and ‘meditate.’
page 276 note 3 The words are chosen to suggest Indra and Nandana.
page 276 note 4 Ghanānurāga means both ‘intense devotion’ and ‘thick reddening’ (of red pollen floating in the air). In its ethical sense anurāga is a phase of saṅga.
page 276 note 5 As so often, the plantain (Musa sapientum
page 276 note 7 Ātāpine is glossed as kelasayan tavannāvū vīryā 
ti, ‘ having valour consuming the kilesas.’
page 276 note 8 So the sannaya ; the strife is with the kilesas.
page 277 note 1 This is interesting as presenting one of the roots which Western Orientalists in their wisdom call ‘ artificial,’ but in fact had a real, if obscure, life outside the Dhātupāhas. In its secondary sense samaṇa is analysed by our poet as sa-maṇa, ‘with noise.’
page 277 note 2 Nāgasena, having been in v. 12 compared by a pun upon his name to an elephant, is now likened to a “flood of glory.” The verse means that the hermitages in which at the end of the Spring he spends the vassa or rainy season (July–August) are blessed by his presence.
page 277 note 3 Nāgasena is contrasted with Śiva. The Sinh. explains sūlapāṇī as secondarily meaning ‘torturing the body.’ Kapāladhārī is to be analysed secondarily as kapāladha-ari.
page 278 note 1 Namely Kāma.
page 278 note 2 The Sinh. translates āsā yato by ē ē dikhi yamheyakin, taking āsā as disā.
page 278 note 3 I.e. even coming as an enemy. Secondarily to be analysed as sa nāgaseno, “this Nāgasena.”
page 279 note 1 The seven aṅgas are enumerated in the sannaya as svāmy amātyās suhṛt kośo rāṣṭradurgabalāni ca, which slightly diverges from the text of Manu ix, 294, and Yājñavalkya i, 352.
page 281 note 1 Namely dharma, artha, and kāma.
page 281 note 2 I take pavandā as ablative ; the Sinh. regards it as adjective, meaning hamannāvū pavan ti, ‘having uniform wind.
page 281 note 3 Sarasa as referring to the birds is ‘ noisy,’ as referring to the flowers ‘ sweet.’
page 282 note 1 Referring to the temptation of the Buddha by the daughters of Māra, who are compared to clouds, the influence of which upon the peacock is a commonplace. Ra-kara is ‘ fire-ray (aggimhi ro, says Saddhammakitti in his Ekakkhara-kosa; a Sanskrit Ekāksharī-kośa says raś ca rāme ’nile vahnau bhūmāv api dhane ’pi ca).