Atkahda Vihara Rock Inscription

Abstract

Atkanda Vihara is the modern name of the site of an ancient Buddhist monastery, situated in the village of Kotakanda, Allepotana in the A. G.A.’s division of Kahatagasdigiliya in the Kanadara Korale, Nuvaragam Palata East of the Anuradhapura District. According to an inscription found at this monastery site it is dateable to the second or third century B. C. Bell has recorded its discovery and has given an account of this site in the Seventh Progress Report of the Archaeological Survey of Ceylon, 1896 as follows: “Kotakanda (‘Squat hill’) is an insignificant looking cluster of wooded rocks, bearing slightly east of north from Kok-ebe-kanda about one and a half to two miles in a B line, and less than a mile north-west of Elapattava, a small Moor village.........