Tale
Pujavaliya: A Sinhala Classic of the 13th Century
පූජාවලිය
Mayurapada Buddhaputra Thera · 1266
Synopsis
Thirty-four chapters, most of which carry the word offering in their title, tell of the homages paid to the Buddha over the course of his existences, starting from the one in which an earlier Buddha announced to him that he would attain enlightenment. The accounts feature the Master and his disciples, give laypeople lessons in conduct and recall the law of actions and their fruits. The thirty-fourth chapter turns to the island itself and reviews the kings who have ruled it.
Context
Composed around 1266, the work is regarded as a distinctive contribution to the style of Sinhalese prose. The historian M. B. Ariyapala sees in it the beginning of a popular literature, made to be understood by the learned as well as by those who were not. The chapter devoted to the kings of Lanka also made it a document: B. Gunasekara, chief government translator for Sinhalese, published in Colombo in 1895 an English version entitled A Contribution to the History of Ceylon, with a glossary of Pali and Sinhalese terms.
Who it is for
A long compilation in Sinhala, readable in English in a translation in several volumes; no French translation.
Prizes and reception
Ranked among the great Sinhala prose works of the thirteenth century; its last chapter is read as a source for the history of the island's kings.
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