P Li Literature Essay

Introduction
I

P?li Literature consists of four major divisions as in the canonical (pi?aka), commentarial (a??hakath?), sub-commentarial (??k?) and modern (prakara?a) texts.? The modern texts (prakara?a) cover an extensive range which includes chronicles, grammar, lexicons, sandesa-s etc. Va?sakath? is the literature that records unbroken or continual? history of a person or a thing.? The Va?sakath?, composed and compiled in verses or prose, Camp? and ?khy?na stands apart from other literary features in P?li. Nal??a (lal??a) dh?tuva?sa (hence forth NDV), chronicle of the sacred frontal relics of the Buddha is given less attention by modern P?li and Buddhist scholars. The late Prof. Malalasekara is the only scholar to date who has given a

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Analyzing the literary features of NDV, some narratives are found too. The story of King N?ga Sumana in the first chapter clearly indicates history and narration. In the fifth chapter, again we find a narrative disclosing the previous life or lives (?) of King K?kava??atissa. The format of this narrative is apparently equal to that of the J?taka stories.
Investigating further, the NDV takes in some stanzas and prose which were either directly or indirectly cited from other P?li texts. For instance, direct quotations are taken from the Buddhava?sa,? Mah?va?sa,? and Dhammapada?. (BETTER IF SUPPORTED WITH AN EXAMPLE EACH IF POSSIBLE).And indirectly, it throws open some prose paragraphs which are equal to Thup, too. These similarities might probably be due to the usage of the same Por??a??hakath?. (IT IS GOOD TO SUPPORT WITH SOME

Anyway, on some occasions, I do agree with the terms of MSS and see pointless suggestions by Sinhalese editor. In the meantime, the only English edition by Cha??hasa?g?yan? has indications of transliterated Nandarathana?s work. This means that there is not any dependable English edition except two Sinhalese. This academic gap motivated me to produce a new edition of NDV in English. I appreciate the commendable discipline and worth of Sinhalese editors, especially, venerable Nandaratane throughout his work. He does not correct some grammatical errors appeared in original MSS. His practice is very important because this text implies different language styles in the history of P?li Literature. We should preserve original form of the terms to understand the real language form of a text. In keeping with this, I too attempted to maintain the original but suitable term throughout the text. Besides, I checked the meters used by the author and edited a few places in the treatise accordingly.

? Vimalavamsa, B. (1983) p139

? Chunks of Bamboo are connected each other with a nodule. So, it appears as unbroken (linked) one. This unbroken nature is called as va?sa

? The ?va?sa? literature in Pali can be academically divided into three as great biographies based, sacred materials based and incidents based chronicles. The Mah?va?sa, C?lava?sa and Buddhaghosuppatti are