Mahavamsa gets recognition in UNESCO’s Memory of the World International Register

Mahāvaṃsa has been listed among the 64 new items of documentary heritage inscribed on the UNESCO’s Memory of the World (MoW) International Register in 2023.

Issuing a press release, on Monday night, the UNESCO said the Mahavamsa was the first of its kind in South Asia, initiating a mature historiographical tradition, presenting Sri Lanka’s history in a chronological order from the 6th century BCE.

UNESCO added that the authenticity of the facts provided in the document has been confirmed through archaeological research conducted in Sri Lanka and India.

It is an important historical source in South Asia containing crucial information about the lifetime of the Buddha, the Emperor Asoka and the rise of Buddhism as a world religion, the UNESCO said.

“The document played a significant role in popularising Buddhism in Southeast Asia and contributed singularly to the identity of Emperor Asoka in Indian history,” the press release said.

The existence of a number of manuscripts of the Mahavamsa in several countries as well as the transliteration and translation of the text to several Southeast Asian and European languages stand testimony to its immense historical, cultural, literal, linguistic and scholarly values,” the UNESCO said.

Mahāvaṃsa was first written in the 5th or 6th century, probably by the Buddhist monk Mahānāma and covered the period from about the 6th century BC to the early 4th century AD.

However, the Mahāvaṃsa has been updated repeatedly by successive authors and concludes on 1815, when the British occupied the whole of Lanka by military force.