On Yuan Chwang's Travels in India, 629–645 A.D. v2.c17.s2.7

v2.c17.s2.7

The story of king Asoka and the dragon who guarded the Relic Tope at Rāma is told in several Buddhist books with variations. The Divyāvadāna, like our pilgrim's narrative, represents king Asoka as going to the Nāga's Relic Tope, and on seeing the nāga's worship, as going away without interfering with the sacred relics.¹ But the "Tsa-a-han-ching" represents Asoka as carrying off the relics in the tope in spite of the dragon's remonstrances.² The Sinhalese have a legend about the nāga (or also nāgas) and this tope. According to one of their books the relics were removed from Rāmagāma (probably the Rāma of our author) by supernatural means to Ceylon; but this is a late and local fiction.³