Note 3 — Chapter XXV · VAISALI. THE TOPE CALLED “WEAPONS LAID DOWN.” THE COUNCIL OF VAISALI.

(3) Ambapali, Amrapali, or Amradarika, “the guardian of the Amra (probably the mango) tree,” is famous in Buddhist annals. See the account of her in M. B., pp. 456-8. She was a courtesan. She had been in many narakas or hells, was 100,000 times a female beggar, and 10,000 times a prostitute; but maintaining perfect continence during the period of Kasyapa Buddha, Sâkyamuni’s predecessor, she had been born a devi, and finally appeared in earth under an Amra tree in Vaisali. There again she fell into her old ways, and had a son by king Bimbisara; but she was won over by Buddha to virtue and chastity, renounced the world, and attained to the state of an Arhat. See the earliest account of Ambapali’s presentation of the garden in “Buddhist Suttas,” pp. 30-33, and the note there from Bishop Bigandet on pp. 33, 34.