Indian Antiquary Vol 42

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 59

FEBRUARY, 1913]
BOOK-NOTICE
BOOK-NOTICE THE MARAVANGA OR THE GREAT CHRONICLE OF CEY. them certain amount of miraculous matter. LON. Translated into English by WIL RLM GEIGER, But they do not stand alone among ancient Ph.D., Professor of Indo-Gormanio Philology at Er
histories in presenting such matter. And when langen University, assisted by MABEL HAYNEB
we have made the necessary elimination, which BODE, Ph.D., Lecturer on PAli at University College,
is not difficult, there remains, easily recognizLondon. Demy 870 : pp. lxiv, 300; with a map of Ancient Ceylon. Published for the Pali Text
able, a residue of matter-of-fact statements, in Society by Henry Frowde; London : 1912.
respect of which the chronicles have already been
found to be supported by external evidence to [Reprinted, by permission, from the
such an extent that we need not hesitate about J. R. A. S., 1912, p. 1110 f.]
accepting others of their assertions, which,
though perhaps we cannot as yet confirm them Professor Geiger gave us in 1908 his critical
in the same way, present nothing which is at all edition of the text of the Original Mahavarasa;
staxtling and naturally incredible. that is, of chapters 1 to 36 and verses 1 to 50 of chapter 37 of the whole work, béing that portion In dealing with the chronology, Professor Geiger which was written to rearrange, expand, and ex- has accepted B.O.483 as "the probable year" of the plain the Dipavamsa (see p. 11 of the introduc death of Buddha (p. 24). That particular year is tion to the translation). He has now followed undoubtedly the best result that we have attained, that up by his translation of the text, published in and that we are likely to attain unless we can English through the co-operation of Mrs. Bode: | make some new discovery giving us the absolute Professor Geiger made his translation in German; certainty which we do not possess. For a brief Mrs. Bode turned his translation into English; statement of the manner in which it is fixed, see and the English rendering was then revised by p. 239 above: Professor Geiger has added obser Professor Geiger: we may congratulate both vations of (1112) his own (pp. 26, 28-30), based collaborators on the result. Asis well known, the on something pointed out by Mr. Wickremas. text of the Dipavamsa, with an English transla- | inghe, endorsing it. As regards one item in the tion, was given by Professor Oldenberg in 1879. process by which it is fixed, the interval of 218 We are now at last provided with reliable and years from the death of Buddha to the anointeasy means of studying both the great Ceylonese ment of Aboka " is supported," as Professor Buddhist chronicles.
Geiger has said (p. 25), "by the best testimony (1111] Professor Geiger's translation is preceded and has nothing in it to call for suspicion." As by an introduction of 63 pages, in eleven sec- regards another item, we need not hesitate about tions, in which he has discussed a variety of accepting 28 years according to the two Ceyimportant points.
lonese chronicles, against the 25 years of the In the first place, he has briefly recapitulated
Puriņas, as the true length (in round numbers)
of the reign of Bindusara. This last considerathe demonstration given in his Dipavainsa and
tion, we may add, entails placing the anoint. Mahavamsa (1905) that the two chronicles were
ment of Aboka in B.C. 265 or 264 (p. 27): if that based on an older work, known as the AtthakathA-Mahavamsa, which must have come down
should still remain unwelcome to anyone who, originally to only the arrival of Mahendra in
taking one item from one source and the other Ceylon (in the time of Asoka), but was after.
from another source, would place both the death
and the anointment four or five years earlier, - wards continued to the reign of Mab&sêna first
well; it can be shown on some other occasion that half of the fourth century A.D.).
there is nothing opposed to B.C. 265 or 264, for In the second place, Professor Geiger, defend- the anointment of Asoka, in the mention of cer. ing the two chronicles against what he has just- tain foreign kings in the thirteenth rock-edict. ly described (p. 14) as "undeserved distrust and So, also, though the matter does not affect that exaggerated scepticism," has shown that they are point we may safely follow the 37 years of the two to be accepted safely as reliable historical re- chronicles, against the 36 years of the Puranas, na cords, with a framework of well-established the length (in round numbers) of the reiga of datos. We have, indeed, to clear away from Asoka.