1. Ayojjhā.-A city of the Ganges (but see below in this article). Two visits of the Buddha to this city are recorded in the Canon; on one occasion he preached the Phena Sutta (S.iii.140ff ) and on the other the Dārukkhandha Sutta (S.iv.179f). In both these references the city is said to be on the Ganges; the town usually called Ayojjhā (Ayodhya) is certainly not on this river. The records, therefore, go back either to a confused or an unintelligent tradition (see Thomas: op. cit., 15; cf. Sāketa), or may possibly refer to another settlement made by colonists from the original Ayojjhā. It is worthy of note that in the Dārukkhandha Sutta some of the MSS. read Kosambī for Ayojjhā. But even Kosambī (q.v.) was on the Jumnā and not on the Ganges.
During the Buddhist period, Ayojjhā on the Sarayū was the capital of Dakkhina Kosala, the janapada roughly corresponding to modern Oudh. This, the Ayodhyā of the Ramayana, is about a mile from the modern Fyzabad. In the Jātaka Commentary (J.iv.82) there is a mention of Ayojjhā, which here evidently refers to the city of the Sanskrit epics. It is called the capital of King Kālasena. It was besieged by the Andhavenhuputtā, who breached the wall and took the king prisoner. Having thus subjugated the city, they went to Dvāravatī.
The Dīpavamsa (iii.15) mentions Ayujjhanagara as the capital of King Arindama and of fifty-five of his descendants.
According to Buddhaghosa (SA.ii.233-4), the people of Ayujjhanagara built for the Buddha a vihāra in a spot surrounded by forest near a curve of the river. Once a warrior named Jagatipāla, of the race of Rāma, came to Ceylon from Ayojjhā, and having slain Vikkampandu, the heir-apparent to the throne, ruled in Rohana for five years. Cv.lvi.13ff.
2. Ayojjhā.-Capital of Siam. From there Vijayarājasīha, King of Ceylon, obtained monks for his own country (Cv.xcviii.91f). A few years later his successor, Kittisirirājasīha, sent an embassy there for the same purpose.
The King of Siam showed the embassy every mark of favour and granted them the monks. The monks, who came from Ayojjhā to Ceylon, re-established the ordination of monks in the Island. Cv.xcviii.60-139; see also J.R.A.S. (Ceylon Branch), 1903, No.54, pp.17ff.