• Anjana-vana (Añcana-vana)

A garden at Sāketa. In it was a Deer-park where the Buddha used to stay. On one such occasion Kakudha came to see him (S.i.54), and also the Paribbājaka Kuñdaliya (S.v.73) who lived near by. Here were preached the Sāketa Sutta, (S.v.219) the Sāketa Jātaka (J.i.308; DhA.iii.317ff.; SnA.531) and the Jarā Sutta.

When Ananda was staying there a nun of the Jatila persuasion visited him and questioned him on the use of samadhi (A.iv.427-8).

The Thera Jambugāmiyaputta (ThagA.ii.86; SnA.531) dwelt there while yet a novice. Once the Buddha was staying at Añjanavana with a large company of monks and some of the monks slept on the sandbanks of the river Sarabhū near by. During the night floods rose and the Thera Gavampati controlled the water by his mystic powers (Ibid., i.104; Thag.v.38).

The elder Bhūta (ThagA.ii.494) stayed in Añjana-vana while visiting his relatives in Sāketa, and the Thera Añjanavaniya spent the rainy season there on a couch (ThagA.ii.127). There Sujātā met the Buddha, and having listened to his discourse became an arahant (Thig.vv.145-50).

In ancient times the king of Kosala used to hunt in this garden, thus it was that the deer Nandiya met him (J.iii.270f).

The garden was so-called because it was thickly covered with añjanna-creepers that bore collyrium-coloured flowers. Others say that añjana is the name of a spreading tree (ThagA.ii.128; SA.iii.195).