George Turnour

George Turnour Jnr, CCS (1799–1843) was a British colonial administrator, scholar and a historian. A member of the Ceylon Civil Service, he served as a Government Agent, Assistant Colonial Secretary and Treasurer of the Colony. He is known for his translation of the Mahavamsa, the Great Chronicle of Sri Lankan history which was published in 1837.^[1] Along with James Prinsep and Captain Edward Smith, he began to decipher the inscriptions on the first discovered Pillar of Ashoka.