Which sacred fig in Sri Lanka is often cited as the oldest living human-planted tree with a known planting date?

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The sacred fig in Sri Lanka often cited as the oldest living human-planted tree with a known planting date is the Jaya Sri Maha Bodhi.

This Ficus religiosa stands in Mahamewuna Garden in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka. Buddhist tradition holds that it grew from a cutting of the original Bodhi tree at Bodh Gaya in India, beneath which Siddhartha Gautama attained enlightenment.

The cutting was brought to Sri Lanka in 236 BC by Sangamitta Maha Theri, a Buddhist nun and daughter of the Indian emperor Ashoka. It was planted during the reign of King Devanampiya Tissa, giving the tree an unusually well-documented planting date and an age exceeding 2,300 years.

A common mix-up is to confuse it with the Bodhi tree at Bodh Gaya, which is the pilgrimage site's historically revered tree but not the Sri Lankan specimen named in this question. Treaty Oak, Lone Cypress, and Major Oak are famous trees, but none matches this combination of age, human planting, and recorded date.

Source: Wikipedia · fact-checked Sept. 2026

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