Molligoda Copper Plate Charter

Molligoda Copper Plate Charter (Sinhala: මොල්ලිගොඩ තඹ ප්‍රධානය) is a copper plate grant issued by the last king of Sri Lanka, Sri Vikrama Rajasingha (1798-1815 A.D.). The plate is presently on the display at the National Museum of Kandy. It is said to have been donated to the museum by Nissanka Panabokke.

The copper plate is 19.125 inches long and 3.75 inches wide (Ranawella, 2015). A scalloped border in Silver runs around the plate (Ranawella, 2015). The front side contains 11 lines of writing and each line is started with a Kundali mark (Ranawella, 2015). The reverse side also has 11 lines of writing. A square frame (2.6875 inches) of Gold with the "Sri" letter in Sinhala is found at the left corner of the front side of the copper plate (Ranawella, 2015).

The copper plate records that King Sri Vikrama Rajasingha (1798-1815 A.D.) appointed Molligoda as a 2nd Adigar and as the Maha Disawa of Four Korales and Pallegampaha Adigar, because of his contribution in suppressing the rebellion lead by Ahalepola Adigar at Sabaragamuwa. The grant has been dated on Thursday, the 6th day of Vesak, in the year Bhava, 1736 of the Saka era (Ranawella, 2015). This date is equivalent to May 1814 A.D. (Ranawella, 2015). According to Ranawella, this copper plate grant is probably the last Sannasa (grant) obtained from a king of the Kandy Kingdom (Ranawella, 2015).

References

1) Ranawella, S., 2015. Archaeological Survey of Ceylon: Inscriptions of Ceylon: Vol. IX. Department of Archaeology. ISBN: 978-955-9159-98-8. pp.72-77.