A History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, so far as it illustrates the Primitive Religion of the Brahmans c8.s3.70.1

c8.s3.70.1

This synchronism once established, it became necessary to accommodate to it, as well as possible, the rest of the legendary history of the Buddhists. It contained but few historical elements previous to Aśoka’s Council, but that council had again to be connected with the history of Ceylon. Aśoka was the cotemporary of Devânâmpriya Tishya, King of Ceylon. This king adopted Buddhism, and made it, like Aśoka, the state religion of the island. Now, according to the traditional chronology of Ceylon, Devânâmpriya Tishya came to the throne 236 years after the landing of Vijaya¹, and he reigned forty years (307—267 B.C.) He was intimately connected with Aśoka, as we shall see, and it was necessary that the same interval which in the historical traditions of Ceylon separated Devânâmpriya Tishya from Vijaya should separate Aśoka from Buddha. This was achieved in the following manner: One Aśoka is supposed to have come to the throne ninety years after Buddha, and a council (the second, as it is called) is supposed to have taken place in the tenth year of his reign, or just one hundred years after Buddha. At that second council a prophecy was uttered that in 118 years a calamity would befall the Buddhist religion. This refers to the reign of the so-called second Aśoka, who was at first a great enemy to religion.