Paṭhamapārājikakathā

The Vinayavinicchaya — the Vinaya summarised in verse so that it can be memorised. This volume holds all of it (CST4 paragraphs 1–10174), and after it the Uttaravinicchaya (10175–13281), Buddhadatta's verse digest of the Parivāra; the heading “Paṭhamapārājikakathā” is only the title of its first chapter.

It is not a beginner's book, whatever its form suggests. Buddhadatta's two books set out to summarise the Vinaya in verse for ease of memory, but he assumes a solid knowledge of the Vinaya in anyone using him, and his standard is considerably higher than that of the later manuals.

Its closing verses are unusually generous with facts, and they place him in India, not Ceylon. Buddhadatta worked in the Coḷa country, in a village called Bhūtamaṅgala on the bank of the Kāverī, in a monastery donated by Veṇhudāsa. The initiator was Buddhasīha, the same name that stands in the Buddhavaṃsa commentary's colophon, and the prose colophon gives his home town as Uragapura. The work was composed under king Acutavikkanta, who may belong to the Kalabhra or to the Kadamba dynasty; the name fixes no year, but it rules out a date later than 600 CE. Tradition makes Buddhadatta a contemporary of Buddhaghosa and tells of the two meeting at sea, Buddhadatta sailing home from Ceylon as Buddhaghosa sailed towards it, and asking for a copy of the commentaries once they were done.

The Uttaravinicchaya carries its own colophon, and it names the same man: buddhadattena racito uttaravinicchayo samattoti, with the same epithets and the same home town, Uragapura.