Culavana or Cullapon, meaning ‘a small forest’ is the sixth episode of the 13 episodes of the Vessantara Jataka and tells of a Brahmin called Jūjaka who was walking to Mount Vamka to ask Prince Vessantara for the two kumara (young prince and princess), Jali and Kanha. On his way, Jūjaka meets the hunter, Jetaputta. When he was chased by the hunter’s dogs, he climbed up a tree where he tricked the hunter by telling him that he was a royal emissary sent to invite Prince Vessantara. The hunter trusted him and showed him the way to Vamkata.
Colophon:
[The writing of this manuscript] was completed at breakfast time in CS 1263, a ruang pao year, on the ninth waxing-moon day of the fifth [lunar] month. I wrote this manuscript titled Culavana. May the merit derive from writing this manuscript reward both of us with the threefold happiness of which Nibbāna is the ultimate one. I, Khanan (ex-monk) Mang, wrote the manuscript but my handwriting was not beautiful. Khanan (ex-monk) Mang wrote this manuscript. He was the principal initiator, together with his wife named Khui and his mother named Ya (grandmother) Sucing, who sponsored the production of this manuscript of Mahā Vessantara, Culavana episode. We wish the threefold happiness of which Nibbāna is the ultimate one.