Padasādhana

A handbook of Pali grammar of the Moggallāna school, announcing itself in its opening verses as following the way of Moggallāyana's treasury of word-meanings. The author is the monk Piyadassi, writing “probably in the early years after the reign of Parākramabāhu I” — so shortly after 1186 CE.

Its colophon is a small lesson in how Pali books were actually made. Gornall points out that Piyadassi wrote only the opening verse, playing on his own title: “Having composed the Padasādhana (‘Forming words’), which I undertook for the benefit of others, may this world through that merit accomplish (sādhetu) the unchanging goal (pada)”. The rest of the colophon is an ornate, Sanskritic praise of his teacher Moggallāna, dwelling “in the beautiful town of Anurādha”. A further verse, added at some point before the 1400s, brings in Piyadassi's maternal uncle Kappiṇa. The book is signed, in other words, by a circle rather than by an author.