- K. M. de Silva,
- Howard A. Wilson,
- S. U. Deraniyagala,
- Senake Bandaranayake,
- Roland Silva,
- Nimal de Silva,
- Ismeth Raheem,
- Diran Kavork Dohanian,
- Albert Dharmasiri,
- Raja de Silva,
- Siri Gunasinghe,
- Robert Elgood,
- R. C. C. Fynes,
- Brendan Lynch,
- Bob Simpson,
- Sirinimal Lakdusinghe,
- K. Hemantha Jayatilleke,
- L. K. Karunaratne
- , and W. Thelma T. P. Gunawardane
Island nation off the southern tip of India. The island has an area of 65,610 sq. km, measuring 435 km from north to south and 225 km from east to west, with a population of around 18 million.
I. Introduction.
Sri Lanka (see fig.) is separated from the main landmass of the Indian subcontinent by the Palk Strait and the Gulf of Mannar, which at their narrowest are only 35 km across; there is a chain of reefs and small islands, known as Adam’s Bridge, across the strait. The island’s proximity to the Indian landmass has meant that Indian influences—religious, cultural and political—have left their stamp on Sri Lanka’s development. Equally important, separation from India by a narrow sea has enabled Sri Lanka to evolve a distinctive culture and civilization of its own. The island’s strategic location on the trade routes of the Indian Ocean made it a stopping place for Greek and Roman vessels and later ships from Persia, the Arab lands, China and South-east Asia. In the 18th and 19th centuries Sri Lanka’s strategic location increased European interest in controlling its shores.

Map of Sri Lanka; those sites with separate entries in this dictionary are distinguished by Cross-reference type
1. Geography, peoples and languages.
- K. M. de Silva
A key feature of Sri Lanka’s geography is the triangular mountainous region in the south-central part of the island. Its highest peak is Pidurutalagala (2524 m). The island’s rivers, apart from the Mahaveli (which has a long and complicated course), are fairly short and run radially outwards from the highlands. The island can be divided into dry, intermediate and wet zones: approximately 65%, 12% and 23% of the land area respectively. The dry zone includes the extensive plain covering the northern half of the island and stretching southward along the east coast to a smaller southern plain. Rainfall (1000–2000 mm a year) is largely restricted to October to January, the period of the north-east monsoon. The wet zone, comprising the south-western quadrant of the island, has heavy rain (2000–5000 mm a year), well distributed seasonally. The most prominent feature of the vegetation is the tropical evergreen forests of the wet lowlands and the subtropical evergreen forests in some of the elevated areas. Among the most valuable mineral deposits are gemstones, which have been exploited for centuries.
From early times Sri Lanka’s population has been multi-ethnic. The two main groups are both of Indian origin, one north Indian and ‘Indo-Aryan’ and the other south Indian and ‘Dravidian’. The majority group (74%) are Sinhalese, a people who first came to the island from north India c. 500 bc. The region of north India that was their original home remains a matter of debate. It appears they mixed with and largely absorbed earlier inhabitants, probably a proto-Australoid ethnic group related to the pre-Dravidian hill people of south India. It is unknown when the second group, the south Indian Tamils (18%), first came as settlers to Sri Lanka. From about the 3rd century bc there appear to have been trade relations between Sri Lanka and south India and possibly also settlements of Tamils who came as traders. Subsequent invasions from south India brought more Tamil settlers. The Tamil population increased in the colonial period when south Indian labourers were brought to work on plantations. There are also Sri Lankans of Arab descent (7%). Smaller ethnic groups include the descendants of European settlers, Malays and the Vaddas, regarded as the descendants of Sri Lanka’s first known residents (see also §II below). The main language is Sinhala; Tamil and English are also widely spoken. The ancient languages of Pali, in which the sacred texts of Theravada Buddhism are written, and Sanskrit are used mainly in religious contexts.
Bibliography
- P. G. Cooray: An Introduction to the Geology of Ceylon (Colombo, 1967)
- G. H. Peiris: ‘The Physical Environment’, Sri Lanka: A Survey, ed. K. M. de Silva (London and Honolulu, 1977), pp. 3–30
- B. L. C. Johnson and M. Le M. Scrivenor: Sri Lanka: Land, People and Economy (London, 1980)
2. History.
- K. M. de Silva
Much of Sri Lanka’s long history is related with considerable accuracy and in great detail (though in moralistic and didactic tones) in two Pali chronicles, the Mahāvaṁsa (‘Great chronicle’) compiled about the 6th century ad and its continuation the Culavaṁsa (‘Little chronicle’) compiled from the 13th to 18th centuries. The work of Buddhist monks, these texts provide reliable source material despite the religious biases inherent in them.
Sri Lanka’s ancient civilization emerged and flourished in its dry zone; the earliest settlements were on the banks of rivers of this region. Rice was the staple crop. Agriculture was, however, dependent on the vagaries of the north-east monsoon. As settlements spread away from river environments there was a need to ensure against droughts. The dry zone prospered owing to the development of a sophisticated irrigation system suited to the region’s geological and geographic peculiarities. Sri Lanka’s irrigation technology ranked among the most developed of the ancient world. By the 1st century bc rivers were blocked by earthen dams, great tanks, or reservoirs, had been created and large irrigation canals and smaller channels laid out. The prosperity and expansion in population that resulted were important in the establishment of centralized rule in Sri Lanka with the capital at Anuradhapura in the northern dry zone.
Also important for the integration of the island were the spread of Buddhism and creation of a common Sinhalese culture. Buddhism was, according to tradition, brought to Sri Lanka by a mission dispatched by the Indian emperor Ashoka (reg c. 269–232 bc) and led by his son Mahinda. It is said that King Devanampiya Tissa (reg c. 250–210 bc) was the first to accept Buddhism and the conversion of his subjects followed. Centralization of rule at Anuradhapura began in the reign of King Dutthagamani Abhaya (reg c. 161–137 bc). The city’s kings made the endowment of Buddhist monasteries and institutions a high priority. Among the most striking monuments that they built were stupas (Sinh. dāgabas), solid hemispherical mounds enshrining relics of the Buddha or the more celebrated teachers of early Buddhism. Stupas dominated the skyline of Anuradhapura and were awe-inspiring testimony of the State’s commitment to Buddhism and evidence of the wealth at its command. Nobles and ordinary lay Buddhists were also generous donors. Anuradhapura became a sprawling urban complex, and at its height was one of the great cities of ancient South Asia. The capital remained there for some 1200 years except for a short break of approximately 20 years in the 5th century when the seat of government was moved to Sigiriya and brief periods in the 7th and 8th centuries when Polonnaruva was the capital.
The Sinhalese kingdom became in time an integral part of the power politics of southern India, as the kings of Sri Lanka were drawn into shifting alliances between Pandyas, Pallavas and Cholas. The island’s northern plain was vulnerable to invasion from south India, and such invasions were frequent. For many centuries the Sri Lankans met them with resilience. In 992, however, the powerful Cholas succeeded in annexing the northern part of the island. The south was added to the Chola empire in 1017. Sinhalese power was re-established in 1070 under King Vijayabahu I (reg 1055–1110), who moved the capital to the more easily defended city of Polonnaruva. Though a more compact city, Polonnaruva resembled Anuradhapura with its palaces, stupas and tanks.
Continuing foreign invasions, the marriage of south Indian royal families into those of Sri Lanka and the resulting succession disputes, and other destabilizing factors led to the collapse of the Sinhalese kingdom in the 13th century. As non-Sinhalese gained control in the north, the Sinhalese claimants to the throne and their followers moved to the wetter, hilly and more densely forested south-west quarter of the island and established rival centres of power. The ruling city changed frequently. Capitals included Dambadeniya, Kurunegala, Gampola, Rayigama, Kotte and Kandy. Rice was still a main crop in the wet lands, but its cultivation was less successful. Trade in cinnamon, pepper, cardamom and other spices became an important source of state revenue. Buddhist institutions were endowed and monuments built, but on a smaller scale than in the earlier capitals. In the 13th century a Tamil kingdom was established in the north of the island with its capital at Jaffna. It survived for about three centuries.
Despite political turmoil, Sri Lanka enjoyed enormous regional prestige as the home of Theravada Buddhism. With the establishment of Muslim rule in north India (c. 1200) and the disappearance of Buddhism there, Indian Buddhist holy places were no longer readily accessible to devotees. Sri Lanka came to be regarded by the Buddhists of Burma, Thailand and Cambodia as a second—almost a surrogate—holy land of Buddhism because of the relics of the Buddha preserved at the island’s major centres of worship. This South-east Asia link left its mark on the architecture of some of the Buddhist monuments of Sri Lanka, most notably in Polonnaruva.
Western influence began with the arrival of the Portuguese. By 1600 they were well established in Sri Lanka, despite resistance from the Sinhalese. Within 60 years they were displaced by the Dutch, with the active support of the Sinhalese, and the Dutch, in their turn, by the British in 1795–6. Much of the interior of the island, however, remained independent under kings ruling from Kandy until 1815, when the Kandyan kingdom succumbed to the British. For the first time in several centuries, one power controlled all of Sri Lanka. Under British rule, the island was welded into a centralized political entity; the economy was transformed through the development of plantation agriculture, with coffee the dominant crop in the earlier stages, to be replaced later by tea, rubber and coconut.
The Europeans’ impact is visible in Sri Lankan architecture. The Portuguese were the first builders of domestic dwellings of any substantial or permanent kind. The Dutch left a more lasting impression on the architecture of the island through their successful adaptation of European building modes and techniques to the requirements of a warm climate. This legacy influenced British colonial architecture in the island in the early years of their rule, but Britain’s architectural contribution was not substantial. Perhaps the greatest impact on Sri Lankan art was the introduction of Western art forms during the British period.
Sri Lankan pressures for a greater say in the island’s government began in the late 19th century. Constitutional reforms, introduced in 1931, amounted to the first significant step towards self-rule. In 1931 universal suffrage was introduced in Sri Lanka, the first of Britain’s Asian colonies to enjoy this boon; few events in Sri Lanka’s recent history have had so profound an impact on its politics and society. The island was granted independence on 4 February 1948. The transfer of power was smooth and peaceful, a reflection of the moderate tone of the dominant strand of the country’s nationalist movement. Since independence Sri Lanka’s economic and political development has been retarded by acutely divisive ethnic and, to a lesser extent, religious tensions. Yet despite all this Sri Lanka has sustained impressive gains. In the post-independence period a third or more of the annual budget has been spent on social welfare, and this has helped to narrow the gap between the rich and poor more effectively than in many Asian and African states. One result is an impressive 87% literacy of all Sri Lankans ten years of age or older.
Bibliography
- H. W. Codrington: A Short History of Ceylon (London, 1926)
- G. C. Mendis: The Early History of Ceylon: And its Relations with India and Other Foreign Countries (Calcutta, 1932; Colombo, 4/1946)
- H. C. Ray, ed.: History of Ceylon, 1 (Colombo, 1959–60)
- A. Arasaratnam: Ceylon (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1964)
- K. M. de Silva: A History of Sri Lanka (London, 1981)
- C. R. de Silva: Sri Lanka, a History (New Delhi, 1987)
3. Religion and iconography.
- Howard A. Wilson
Buddhists form the largest religious group in Sri Lanka (65% of the population in 1990), followed by Hindus (20%), Christians (8%) and Muslims (7%). The introduction of Buddhism to the island around the 3rd century bc determined in many ways the shape and character of Sinhalese culture. The intermingling of ‘religious’ and ‘national’ identity underlies the importance many Sinhalese place on protecting and preserving Buddhism in their homeland. Hinduism, brought to the island at an early date, became less evident after the arrival of Buddhism. From the 6th century ad, however, it re-emerged with an important role as the religion of the Tamil minority. Islam was brought through trade links; Christianity, which may have been practised from an early date, was brought in many sectarian varieties by European colonizers. The Roman Catholicism of the Portuguese developed stronger roots in the island than the various forms of Protestantism of the Dutch and British.
(i) Buddhism.
One of the first mission fields of Buddhism, Sri Lanka has nourished the tradition for some 2300 years, the longest continuous Buddhist history in the world (see also Buddhism, §III, 2). Theravada Buddhism has been the dominant and most enduring form. The Theravada tradition has fostered a distinctive way of life and a particular form of culture, the Buddha-sasana. Mahayana Buddhism, which spread to the island in the 3rd century ad or earlier, was influential for over a thousand years. The Abhayagiri Monastery in Anuradhapura, which became its centre, was suppressed by King Parakramabahv I in ad 1165; his reunification and ‘purification’ of the saṅgha (monastic community) re-established Sri Lanka as a model of Theravada Buddhist society. Six features in particular are emblematic of this island of Buddhism (dhammadīpa): the sacred texts known as the Tipiṭaka, the Mahabodhi tree, the dāgaba (stupa), the daḷadā (tooth relic), the footprint of Buddha and the Buddha image, the focus of Sri Lanka’s Buddhist art.
One of Sri Lanka’s most important contributions to Theravada Buddhism is the preservation of the Tipiṭaka, the Theravada canon. When Ashoka’s embassy headed by Mahinda arrived in Sri Lanka in the 3rd century bc, the teachings were brought as an oral tradition. At the time of King Vattagamani Abhaya (reg 89–77 bc) the tradition was committed to writing in the Pali language at Aluvihara, near Matale. Sri Lanka became the vital repository of these scriptures for the Theravada world. The scriptures were copied on strips of palm-leaf (ola), and the fragile leaves protected by covers of wood, often intricately painted, or of carved ivory.
The Mahabodhi tree grew from a cutting of the tree at Bodhgaya under which the Buddha attained enlightenment. It was brought to Sri Lanka by Sangamitta, a Buddhist nun and daughter of Ashoka, and rooted at Anuradhapura. The tree was planted on a high terrace and surrounded by a railing with gates at the four cardinal points. There was also an empty throne (āsana) beneath the tree as an aniconic reminder of the Buddha. Such tree shrines (bodhighara) were eventually replicated at every monastery on the island.
The dāgaba, the focal point of most monastic complexes, is associated with the Buddha’s death and passage into nirvāṇa (Pali parinibbāṇa). As such it was a reminder of the Buddha and a symbol of the nirvāṇa to which every pious Buddhist aspired. Over time, the ancient burial mound came to be regarded as Mt Meru, the ‘world mountain’, and was oriented with its four gates to the four directions of the earth. Its central shaft joined earth and sky and thus the physical and the spiritual dimensions of life. In its centre was a relic (dhātu), which served as a sacred reminder of the Buddha and his teaching (see also Stupa, §2). The largest dāgabas dwarf those of India (the Jetavana at Anuradhapura: h. 123 m, diam. 113 m; the Great Stupa at Sanchi: h. 18 m, diam. 36.6 m). Some smaller dāgabas were of a distinctive covered form (vaṭadāgē), with wooden pillars supporting the roof.
Sri Lanka’s most celebrated relic, the daḷadā or tooth of the Buddha, was brought to the island sometime after ad 361, according to tradition by a Brahmin princess who concealed it in her hair. By the time of the Polonnaruva period (c. 1070–1250) the relic had attained great importance and its possession was regarded as essential for the exercise of royal sovereignty. A cultus arose surrounding it and a Dalada Maligawa, a ‘palace’ of the tooth relic, was built to house it adjoining each royal palace in succession. Once a year the relic is carried in procession through the streets of Kandy on the back of a great bull elephant for the ten nights preceding and on the night of the full moon of August. This is the famous Esala Perahera (August procession).
The Buddha’s footprint (pada) has a special significance in Sri Lanka in that the Buddha is said to have visited the island and left his footprint on the second highest peak, Samantakuta (2243 m). Named for the tutelar deity Saman, the peak is also known as Sri Pada. The mountain and its footprint appear often in Buddhist design motifs, particularly in vihāra (monastery) painting where the soḷosmasthāna (the 16 sacred sites of pilgrimage on the island) are frequent subject-matter. The peak is also sacred to Hindus, Muslims and Christians and the ascent of the mountain is one of the most famous pilgrimages of the island.
Central to the Sri Lankan sculptural tradition is the Buddha image. Artists sought to embody the two ideals of wisdom and compassion in their portrayal of the Buddha. If the masterpieces of Gupta India emphasize compassion, the Sri Lankan tradition emphasizes the strength of the solitary arhat and the great serenity that accompanies his quest for wisdom. There is an ascetic and austere restraint about the Sri Lankan Buddha image that conveys great strength and spiritual heroism.
Two iconographic consequences followed the arrival of Mahayana Buddhism: the practice of carving colossal Buddha images and the representation of bodhisattvas, particularly Avalokiteshvara, Tara, Maitreya and Manjushri. The c. 8th-century colossal (h. c. 12 m) east-facing Buddha known as the Aukana (literally ‘sun-eating’) Buddha is carved almost in the round on an enormous vertical rock face some 50 km from Anuradhapura. The giant form conveys undeniable spiritual majesty and expresses the Mahayanist conception perfectly: the cosmic character of the Buddha filling the universe, at the same time as he transcends it. The seven figures carved in high relief at Buduruvagala include a central Buddha (h. 15.5 m) of the 9th or 10th century flanked by two bodhisattvas (h. c. 12 m), each with two attendants. Some of the most famous Buddha statues on the island are the four at the Uttararama, or Gal Vihara, at Polonnaruva dating from the mid-12th century. The first is a seated figure within a cave cut from the rock, the second a magnificent seated Buddha surrounded by Tantric symbols, the third an unusual standing Buddha (h. c. 7 m) in a cross-armed pose (the face filled with compassion for a suffering humanity) and the fourth a reclining Buddha (l. c. 14 m) symbolizing the Buddha’s passing into parinibbāṇa. Among the finest Sri Lankan bodhisattva figures is the gilt-bronze Tara (h. 1.46 m; London, BM) dated by scholars variously from the 7th–8th century to the 12th.
Representations of the Buddha also dominated the art of wall painting. The walls of the inner chamber, the ambulatory and the antechamber of the image-house (paṭimāghara), one of the most important structures of the monastic complex, were covered with paintings usually in horizontal bands in a continuous narrative. Subjects are: the 24 Buddhas (Sūvisi Vivaraṇa) who preceded Gautama; the retelling of the Buddha’s life story (Buddha Carita); the 16 sacred places of Buddhist pilgrimage in Sri Lanka (Soḷomasthāna); a number of the best-known jātakas (stories of the Buddha’s previous lives); and, particularly in coastal monasteries, scenes of hell appropriate to various wrongs committed. The ceilings are covered with floral designs or with paintings of the planetary and astral worlds and the celestial palaces of the gods. All these paintings evoke the world of the Buddha, a transcendent realm of religious symbols that is very different from the world outside. The worshipper who enters the image-house changes worlds, returning to the centre of his or her religious and cultural identity. The whole complex may be envisaged as a series of concentric circles, beginning at the entrance where one takes the first step of spiritual development, subsequently ‘reading’ all the symbols of the Buddha’s life and the morals of the jātaka tales, and ending with the Buddha at the centre.
Buddhist symbolism is also reflected in a variety of other ways in religious structures. One of the most characteristic is the Sinhalese entrance. It is comprised of a set of stairs, with a carved moonstone at the base, and a guardstone and a balustrade on either side. Guardstones typically portray nāga-kings holding a flower-filled pot-of-plenty. The semicircular moonstone is literally the first step and symbolically the first step on the path of religious development. In a series of carved concentric circles the entire spiritual life is summarized: from the flames of desire on the outer circle, through symbols of the earthly life, to a lotus centre symbolizing the attainment of nirvāṇa.
(ii) Hinduism.
Sri Lankan Hinduism is an extension of the Tamil tradition (see Hinduism, §I), and there is an unbroken continuity between the arts created in the service of Buddhism and Hinduism. In the early period in Sri Lanka neither ethnic divisions nor religious differences were sharply drawn. Hindu temple and Buddhist monastery often stand side by side and there is little distinction in their decorative schemes or iconographic detail. Further, the four guardian deities of Sri Lanka are all of Hindu origin. Upulvan (Vishnu) is the national protector; the others are Saman, Vibeheshana and Kataragama (Skanda or Murugan). Greater differences seem to have developed from the 5th or 6th century ad as a devotional (and sometimes militant) Hindu revival swept southern India, accompanied by the decline of Buddhism there. Interesting bronzes portray four Shaiva saints and hymn-writers of this revival: Manikkavasagar, Sambandar, Appar and Sundarar (Colombo, N. Mus.).
Perhaps the greatest difference between Buddhist and Hindu images is one of inspiration, as seen in the treatment of the Buddha image and the icon most characteristic of Tamil Shaivism, the Nataraja (Shiva as Lord of the Dance). The Buddha image is emblematic of the heroic strength of detachment from the life process and of nirvanic serenity. The icon of Shiva, on the other hand, is charged with energy and symbolizes the dynamic character of the life process. The cosmic dance illustrates the rhythmic interrelationship between opposites in the world process: beginning and end, creation and destruction, appearance and disappearance.
The whole of nature as a ‘divine epiphany’ is evident in the complexity of pattern and happy exuberance of Sri Lanka’s temple art. Pūjā (Skt: ‘worship’) in the Hindu temple is accompanied by the music of flute, drum and bell; the air is heavy with incense and the smell of jasmine, sandalwood and turmeric. Offerings are of the five elements: earth (symbolized by sandalwood paste or ash), water (by water, milk or coconut milk), fire (by oil lamps or camphor), wind (by incense) and ether (by auspicious and sacred sounds).
Among Hindu festivals in Sri Lanka is the colourful Vel procession. The vel is the trident sacred to the god Kataragama and is carried by a great gilded temple cart between important Hindu temples in Colombo. The most important Hindu shrine and pilgrimage centre, located on the Menik River in the south of the island, is also sacred to Kataragama. In July and August thousands of Hindu penitents are joined by many Buddhists in honouring the powerful warrior god. This festival is also celebrated at such other sites as the Nallur Kandaswamy Temple in Jaffna, rebuilt in the 19th century.
Bibliography
- S. Paranavitana: The God of Adam’s Peak (Ascona, 1958)
- S. Paranavitana ed.: History of Ceylon, 1 (Colombo, 1959–60)
- R. Beny: Island Ceylon (London, 1970)
- R. Gombrich: Precept and Practice (Oxford, 1971)
- S. Paranavitana: Art of the Ancient Sinhalese (Colombo, 1971)
- T. Ling: The Buddha (New York, 1973)
- D. K. Dohanian: The Mahayana Buddhist Sculpture of Ceylon (New York and London, 1977)
- R. Silva: ‘Classical Creations’, Sri Lanka, ed. J. G. Anderson (Hong Kong, 1983/R 1992), pp. 281–9
- A. J. Weeramunda and J. Anderson: ‘Society and Religion’, Sri Lanka, ed. J. G. Anderson (Hong Kong, 1983/R 1992), p. 69
- S. Bandaranayake: The Rock and Wall Paintings of Sri Lanka (Colombo, 1986)
- S. Seneviratne: Social Base of Early Buddhism in Southeast India and Sri Lanka, bc 3rd century–3rd century ad (diss., New Delhi, Jawaharlal Nehru U., 1987)
- R. Gombrich: Theravada Buddhism (London, 1988)
- U. von Schroeder: Buddhist Sculptures of Sri Lanka (Hong Kong, 1990)
II. Art of the prehistoric and protohistoric periods.
- S. U. Deraniyagala
The study of Sri Lanka’s prehistory, carried out over the last century, has focused mainly on three sets of archaeological deposits: the Ratnapura Beds in the alluvia of the south-west, the Iranamadu Formation of the coastal dunes of the north and south-east, and the caves of the south-west.
1. Earliest inhabitants.
Evidence indicates that Stone Age people inhabited Sri Lanka by at least as early as 125,000 years before the present (bp), as adduced from the fauna in the Ratnapura Beds and by geochronological and thermoluminescence studies of the Iranamadu Formation at Bundala in the south-east. On the basis of the latter, it has been hypothesized that human beings were present on the island by 300,000 bp, and perhaps even 600,000 bp (the relevant dunes in the north are yet to be investigated systematically).
The main source of human migrations would have been the Indian subcontinent. The landmasses of Africa, West Asia and South-east Asia are each several thousand kilometres away across the Indian Ocean, and it is most unlikely that people were able to cross these expanses except perhaps during the last five or six thousand years. As a lowering of sea-level by about 10 m would serve to connect India and Sri Lanka by a land bridge across the Palk Strait, numerous connections have been postulated for the duration of the Ice Age (Pleistocene) when glacial episodes caused sea-levels to fluctuate. The last land connection with India was probably severed c. 7000 bp but it is likely that from at least as early as 50,000 bp (by analogy with the first settling of Australia) people were capable of crossing the Palk Strait in seacraft. The patterns of communication between India and Sri Lanka would have been complex, with groups moving to and fro in their annual migrations (transhumance) dictated by the quest for food.
Evidence of prehistoric art in Sri Lanka is scant. There is much to be unearthed, but the probability that a correlate of, for instance, French or Spanish Upper Palaeolithic art, as exemplified at Lascaux or Altamira, will be found on the island is low. Assessments of Sri Lanka’s prehistoric environments from c. 700,000 bp onwards (Deraniyagala) suggest that the population densities were consistently low and that the intensity of social interaction would have been at the basic level of the nuclear family on the move in its quest for food and water. Such a social fabric—the result of the equatorial, humid environment being incapable of supporting denser populations—probably did not find an outlet in art, for which social compulsions deriving from population pressures seem to constitute a precondition.
2. Palaeolithic.
From the Early Stone Age (Lower Palaeolithic), dated c. 600,000 to perhaps c. 125,000 bp on the subcontinent, the Acheulian tradition of stone tool manufacture is evident in peninsular India. This tradition is characterized by handaxes that appear to represent the inception of the application of stylistic norms in artefact design, over and above purely functional requirements (for Acheulian in Europe see Bordes, 1968; in India see Sankalia). However, this Acheulian tradition does not appear to have occurred in southernmost India and Sri Lanka. Comparative studies of Acheulian occurrences in Africa and Asia seem to suggest that savannah rather than a densely forested environment was conducive to its presence and that certain raw materials such as sedimentary quartzite were strongly selected for tool manufacture. Neither of these conditions would have been met in Sri Lanka, and it is likely that this at least partially explains the absence of the Acheulian on the island. The stone tools of the Lower Palaeolithic, as found (somewhat dubiously) in Sri Lanka, are purely functional in design, including, for example, choppers on cores and scrapers on flakes with no special idiosyncratic design elements.
The Middle Palaeolithic industrial complex that succeeded the Lower Palaeolithic in India has an estimated central date of c. 125,000 bp, with a range of c. 200,000–c. 50,000 bp. Some of the stone tool assemblages found in Sri Lanka’s Iranamadu Formation are assignable chronologically and stylistically to this complex. While they show signs that formal design was an element in their manufacture, their stylistic traits are relatively amorphous compared, for example, with tools of the French Middle Palaeolithic. Some categories suggest derivation from Acheulian prototypes. If this is the case, it would be interesting to know why the lineal stylistic descendant of the Indian Lower Palaeolithic Acheulian should have taken root in Sri Lanka whereas the Acheulian did not.
The Upper Palaeolithic industrial complex that is said to succeed the Middle Palaeolithic in India—after the West European model (see de Sonneville-Bordes)—is vestigial. Indeed, pending further chronological resolution, it may be argued that the Indian Upper Palaeolithic has been misidentified as such, owing to preconceptions stemming from the classic European sequences, and that in India it is merely a variation on the overall Mesolithic stylistic theme. In Sri Lanka, nothing approaching an Upper Palaeolithic assemblage—characterized by ‘true’ blades and blade-cores—has been identified. In the absence of even a single blade-tool among the hundreds of thousands of artefacts collected on the island, it is somewhat unlikely that an Upper Palaeolithic phase will be discovered in Sri Lanka.
3. Mesolithic.
In Europe the Upper Palaeolithic represents the highpoint in Stone Age artistic creativity, which is often attributed (perhaps somewhat simplistically) to the supersession of Neanderthaloid humans by anatomically modern Homo sapiens. Models pertaining to the European Upper Palaeolithic are tightly knit and self-contained, and do not bear much relevance to data from areas further afield such as West Asia or Africa, where post-Middle Palaeolithic blade industries do occur. It appears that in the Sri Lankan Mesolithic (c. 28,000–3000 bp) a general acceleration of stylistic (i.e. artistic) creativity in the design of stone tools culminated in a stone tool technology characterized by sophisticated geometric microliths, namely small flakes formed into lunates, triangles and trapezoidals by trimming along one or more edges (for technology see Bordaz). It is still unclear whether Mesolithic technology arrived in Sri Lanka fully fledged from India or further afield, or whether it was a local development arising from the Middle Palaeolithic. It is probable that the entire South Asian region was nuclear to the development of Mesolithic technology, as suggested by the exceptionally early radiocarbon and thermoluminescence dates from four different sites in Sri Lanka: Batadomba Cave, Beli Cave at Kitulgala, Bundala Dune and Patirajawela Dune. All of these sites have yielded geometric microliths of superb craftsmanship produced c. 28,000 bp from quartz (Colombo, Dept. Archaeol.), an intractable material. These represent some of the earliest occurrences in the world for this class of artefact and few if any others of comparable antiquity are as well designed. (For specimens from Matupi Cave in Zaïre see van Noten.) Stone tools from the Sri Lankan Mesolithic that may be considered from a purely aesthetic viewpoint include geometric microliths, non-geometric microliths and Balangoda Points with their exquisite pressure-flaked trimming. All seem to have been produced at a supra-functional level, with aesthetics being prominent in their design.
That personal adornment was a part of Sri Lanka’s Mesolithic cultural attributes has been established by the discovery of shell beads (Colombo, Dept. Archaeol.) at Batadomba Cave from horizons that have been radiocarbon-dated to c. 28,000 and 16,000 bp. Among the pigments used by people of that period were red and yellow ochres, chalk and graphite. A fractional human burial excavated at Faxian’s Cave (incorrectly named for the Chinese traveller), near Bulathsinhala, and a piece of human skull (with its rough edges chamfered off) from Ravanalla Cave had red ochre smeared on them. The former has been dated to c. 5400 bp. The latter has not been dated, but it is likely to be at least as old as the Mesolithic, possibly earlier. The Andaman Islanders used red ochre and white clay to adorn their bodies and the bodies of their dead, the complexity of the decoration varying in proportion to the status of the individual (Radcliffe-Brown). Possibly these pigments were similarly employed in Sri Lanka under certain circumstances, although unlike in the Andamans, red ochre-coated human remains are the exception; none of the numerous Mesolithic humans excavated from Batadomba and Beli caves and from the open-air site of Bellan-bandi Palassa (Kennedy, 1965; Kennedy and others, 1986) had red ochre on them. The Vadda aborigines of Sri Lanka, the physical and cultural descendants of the island’s Mesolithic humans (Seligmann and Seligmann; Kennedy, 1974), did not use pigments on themselves, although there is a vague tradition that they did so in the past (expressed, for instance, in a 16th-century poem). The primitive cave art that occurs in the northern and eastern sectors of the island (Nandadeva) is, in the absence of evidence that it is prehistoric, assignable to the Vaddas. Possibly, however, the engravings of animals and symbols found on the cave walls of Doravaka-kanda (Browning) could be proto- or prehistoric; excavations should resolve this point. In general, the concept of wall painting seems to have been an intrusive element that arrived with the Sinhalese settlers c. 2500 bp, to be adopted by the Vaddas in their own idiom.
4. Protohistoric.
In India art flowered with the rise of the protohistoric Neolithic–Chalcolithic cultural complexes during the 5th millennium bp (e.g. the Harappan civilization, Deccan Chalcolithic and southern Neolithic cultures). These, with their farming subsistence strategy, seem to have achieved higher population densities than were previously possible. Sri Lanka, on present evidence, never went through a distinctive Neolithic or Chalcolithic phase, probably owing to the unsuitability of the local environment for Neolithic–Chalcolithic farming technology. Hence, there could be no parallel in Sri Lanka to India’s protohistoric artistic upwelling.
From the beginning of the protohistoric Iron Age in Sri Lanka (c. 3000–2500 bp), farming technology was adequate to deal with the dense tropical vegetation and the heavy soils characterizing the island (Deraniyagala). The result was a rapid growth in population density. During this period the earliest Megalithic mortuary practices occur, deriving directly, it is thought, from the Megalithic complex of peninsular India, which in turn seems to have had at least some of its artistic roots in the preceding Chalcolithic complexes (see Seneviratne). Items of ornament unearthed (Colombo, Dept. Archaeol.) include beads of lapis lazuli, and carnelian indicative of long-distance trade with Badakshan and the Deccan. Eye paint appears to have been in vogue, as suggested by copper kohl applicators. However, it was with the inception of the historical period (c. 2500 bp) that art became a prominent aspect of Sri Lankan society. The urbanized polities of the Gangetic plain in India were distinguished by their art forms, and Sri Lanka, being a node in this network, proved fertile ground for the rooting and development of its own artistic tradition.
Bibliography
- C. G. Seligmann and B. Z. Seligmann: The Veddas (Cambridge, 1911)
- G. F. R. Browning: ‘Some Rock Drawings at Dorawaka in Kegalle District’, Ceylon Antiquary and Literary Register, 4 (1919), pp. 226–7
- A. R. Radcliffe-Brown: The Andaman Islanders (Cambridge, 1922/R 1954)
- U. R. von Ehrenfels: Kadar of Cochin (Madras, 1952)
- D. de Sonneville-Bordes: La Paléolithique supérieure en Périgord (Bordeaux, 1960)
- F. H. Bordes: Typologie du Paléolithique ancien et moyen (Bordeaux, 1961)
- H. D. Sankalia: The Prehistory and Protohistory of India and Pakistan (Bombay, 1962, 2/Poona, 1974)
- K. A. R. Kennedy: ‘Human Skeletal Material from Ceylon, with an Analysis of the Island’s Prehistoric and Contemporary Populations’, British Museum: Geology Bulletin, 2/4 (1965), pp. 135–213
- F. H. Bordes: La paléohistoire dans le monde, Univers. Conn., xxx (Paris, 1968); trans. by J. E. Anderson as The Old Stone Age, World U. Lib. (New York and London, 1968)
- J. Bordaz: Tools of the Old and New Stone Age (New York, 1970)
- K. A. R. Kennedy: ‘The Paleo-Demography of Ceylon’, Perspectives in Paleo-Anthropology, Professor D. Sen Festschrift, ed. A. K. Ghash (Calcutta, 1974), pp. 95–112
- F. van Noten: ‘Excavations at Matupi Cave’, Antiquity, 51 (1977), pp. 35–40
- S. Seneviratne: ‘The Archaeology of the Black and Red Ware Complex in Sri Lanka’, Ancient Ceylon, 5 (1984), pp. 237–307
- K. A. R. Kennedy and others: ‘Biological Anthropology of Upper Pleistocene Hominids from Sri Lanka: Batadomba-lena and Beli-lena Caves’, Ancient Ceylon, 6 (1986), pp. 67–168
- B. D. Nandadeva: ‘Rock Art Sites of Sri Lanka: A Catalogue’, Ancient Ceylon, 6 (1986), pp. 173–207
- S. U. Deraniyagala: The Prehistory of Sri Lanka: An Ecological Perspective (Colombo, 1992)
III. Architecture.
The centre of political, religious and artistic life in Sri Lanka was the capital city of its kings. Architectural developments up until the colonial period are usually classified according to the location of the royal capital.
1. Anuradhapura period–Chola interregnum, c 3rd century bc–11th century ad.
- Senake Bandaranayake and Roland Silva
The structural remains of the Anuradhapura period constitute the oldest expression of the Sri Lankan architectural tradition, covering a period of more than 1500 years and extending over several regions and phases of development. Knowledge of Anuradhapura-period architecture is enhanced by the existence of a reliable historical framework in Sri Lanka’s Pali chronicles, the Mahāvaṁsa and Culavaṁsa (a form of historical documentation unparalleled in South Asia), an epigraphical record dating from the 3rd century bc, and such early codifications of architectural practice as the Manjuśrī-bhāsita-vāstu-vidyā śāstra, assigned to the 5th–7th century ad. However, the findings of more than 100 years of archaeological activity remain the most detailed and reliable source.
(i) Range and types of building.
- Senake Bandaranayake
The Early Anuradhapura period began in the 3rd century bc, after at least two or three centuries of protohistoric development. A Middle Anuradhapura period can be postulated from c. the 4th to 7th/8th century ad, best known from the 5th-century complex at Sigiriya. The Later Anuradhapura period, in which the richest and most elaborate developments in art and architecture occurred, ended in the last decade of the 10th century. It is estimated that there are between 2000 and 3000 Anuradhapura-period sites distributed throughout the country, containing between 50,000 and 70,000 individual structures. Less than half of these have been documented, excavated and conserved. The majority are skeletal remains of Buddhist monastery complexes. Some of the most extensive architectural remains are at Anuradhapura itself. These consist of a number of major and minor monasteries, ranged in a series of roughly concentric circles around a central urban core or citadel, which was once walled and moated.
Important aspects of Anuradhapura architecture are its intricate planning and planning mathematics, its mixed timber-and-brick ‘pagoda’ style—very different from the mainstream architecture of the subcontinent—and the scale of its colossal dāgabas or stupas, which are among the largest structures known to the pre-modern world (the largest, the Jetavana, is 123 m high and 113 m in diameter). Constructed in the early phases of the Anuradhapura period (c. 2nd century bc–c. 3rd century ad), these monumental Buddhist structures have at the centre of their solid and towering brick domes, small, inaccessible relic chambers. Periodically refurbished, they remained in continuous use at least until the 13th century. Also significant is the survival of a range of other building types, including unusual early architectural forms. Outstanding among these are the stupa-temple (vaṭadāgē; see fig.), a circular, roofed and colonnaded temple housing a diminutive central stupa; the tree shrine (bodhighara), a structure open in the middle and built around a sacred bodhi tree which is the principal object of worship (see also §I, 3 above); and the chapter house (uposathaghara). Image-houses, assembly halls, refectories and bathhouses also constitute distinctive Sri Lankan architectural types.
(ii) Monasteries.
- Senake Bandaranayake
The most intricate aspect of Anuradhapura architecture is the layout of its monastic complexes. There are a number of distinct types: the mountain or rock monastery (giri); the park or garden monastery (ārāma), the monastery laid out on a centric plan, of which the great metropolitan monasteries or māhāvihāras are often an example; the pañcāvāsa or ‘five-residence’ monastic college, which sometimes formed part of the mahāvihāra; the suburban or rural monastery type known as the pabbata vihāra; and the meditational or ‘forest’ monastery, as at Ritigala. Rare examples also exist of the typical Indian caturśāla, consisting of a courtyard surrounded on four sides by rows of cells.
The mountain monastery, best seen at a number of boulder-strewn hill sites, represents the earliest Buddhist monastic settlements in the island dating from the last three centuries bc. These were centred on rock-dwellings fashioned out of natural or excavated shelters. The typical rock-shelter or cave monastery consisted of a natural or manmade cavity protected by a deep drip ledge, a screen wall built across the face of the shelter and a lean-to roof. Among the best known are Mihintale and the Isurumuni and Vessagiriya monasteries on the southern outskirts of Anuradhapura. Many ancient rock-shelter monasteries continued to be in use, with some modification, throughout the later periods. Those at Dambulla have remained in continuous use for over two millennia. Literary records and fragmentary remains clearly indicate that a free-standing architecture developed alongside the cave monasteries from the earliest phases of the Anuradhapura period. This was the park or garden monastery; little is known about this type’s character and layout or the form and design of its buildings.
Historical evidence and fragmentary archaeological data indicate that formal concepts in monastery layout developed early in the Anuradhapura period. The basic planning concept that emerged towards the end of the last millennium bc and the first two centuries ad is that of the ‘centric’ plan. The main feature of a centric monastery is that its major buildings are placed in a square or concentric plan around a single focal point. The emergence of the stupa or dāgaba as the characteristic ritual monument of the early period is closely linked with this development. With its pure geometric form and complex symbolism, the stupa introduced into the organic architecture and planning of the early monasteries elements of formalization that do not seem to have existed previously. In time, the stupa began to dominate the monastic complex and the monastery plan evolved around it. The early history of this development remains largely a matter for conjecture, but by the 3rd century ad all the principal stupas of Anuradhapura had reached their present colossal proportions and the major monasteries ranged around them had come into being. Smaller monasteries—such as the Thuparama and Lankarama at Anuradhapura—must have existed at hundreds of urban and rural sites. The centric plan, in various forms, continued to be one of the principal planning concepts in all monastery layouts throughout the Anuradhapura and the subsequent Polonnaruva periods.
The largest extant monasteries at Anuradhapura are the Abhayagiri, Jetavana, Mahavihara and Mirisavati complexes, whose remains mostly date from the Later Anuradhapura period. These form a distinct monastery type, the ‘great monastery’ (mahāvihāra), and display the clearest and most specific expression of the centric plan. They were the metropolitan headquarters of the chapters (nikāyas) into which the Sri Lankan Buddhist monastic order was divided. A component element of these metropolitan mahāvihāras is the pañcāvāsa or ‘five-residence’ monastic college, a semi-autonomous unit centred around a major monastic residence with four smaller residences off its four corners. It has its own entrance lodge, clearly demarcated inner and outer precincts, and often its own refectory, bathhouse and pools.
A parallel development to that of the major metropolitan monasteries and the most frequently encountered monastery type of the Middle and Later Anuradhapura periods is the pabbata vihāra, or pabbatārāma, found in most suburban and rural contexts. The basic plan consists of a large, rectangular, central precinct or quadrangle containing a stupa, a bodhighara, an image-house and a rectangular house or hall (commonly identified as a chapter house or uposathaphara), which was also probably the residence of the abbot. Another important ritual building, of varying form and identity, is sometimes placed within the main precinct or is located in a separate precinct, where it forms a second focal point in the overall monastery plan. The residential units of the pabbata vihāra are arranged either concentrically around the central precinct or, where there are two precincts connected by an axial path or avenue, they surround both precincts and the axial path. Many of the best-known monasteries of this type, especially those in the suburbs of Anuradhapura, are surrounded by a moat, whose significance is probably both symbolic and ornamental.
(iii) Secular architecture.
- Senake Bandaranayake
In a civilization in which the use of permanent materials such as brick and stone was usually restricted to religious and royal buildings—and in some instances to such utilitarian structures as stone bridges and water-control mechanisms—the paucity of secular remains outside a royal context is not surprising. The greater part of the secular architecture of the period was presumably fashioned out of traditional and organic materials still extensively used, such as wood, thatch and clay, and occasionally rubble. Little is known about early urban and rural house forms, other than through brief descriptions in literature, fragmentary evidence from excavations and ethno-archaeological analogy with existing traditional building types.
The most significant evidence of an urban architectural landscape are the outlines of walled and moated urban complexes and sites with substantial urban residues, such as at Anuradhapura, the well-known complex at Sigiriya, the port city of Mantai and at least ten other comparable but little investigated locations. The remains at Anuradhapura and Sigiriya also include ruined palaces, extremely rare examples of such buildings from the 1st millennium in South Asia, and royal and monastic gardens. The best-preserved royal gardens are those at Sigiriya, which date from the 5th century, and the 9th/10th-century Ran-masu-uyana (‘Goldfish park’) at Anuradhapura. The three garden forms at Sigiriya—the symmetrically laid out water gardens, the asymmetrical boulder gardens and the terraced gardens around the central rock and palace—have special importance in the study of garden history as they are the oldest surviving gardens in Asia.
(iv) Development of the image-house.
- Roland Silva
An interesting feature of the architecture of Sri Lanka between the 8th and the 11th centuries is the development of specialized types of edifices. A number of classifications have been proposed for different architectural styles. Image-houses in particular reflect varied idioms.
Vaulted, brick image-houses in what can be termed the Sinhala style survive at such sites as the Maligavila monastic complex, in the south-east of the island. An example dating to the 7th or 8th centuries had an inner cella and an outer circumambulation path. Measuring roughly 35 m square, it had exterior walls some 4 m thick. This design continued in the 9th and 10th centuries and during the wave of Mahayana influence was employed for Mahayana structures. A 9th- or 10th-century image-house for the bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara at the monastic complex of Maligavila is a one-cell unit, almost identical to the earlier Buddha image-house at the same site. The bodhisattva image-house measures c. 24 m square and has walls nearly 3 m thick. A main difference is the siting—the bodhisattva image-house is positioned on the raised saddle of a hill, with the lower slopes of the decline beautifully terraced into five levels. It is likely that the stone pillars and the alternate spur stones for wooden pillars that were discovered supported a timber roof.
Influences from south India are evident in image-houses in what can be termed the Pallava and Chola styles. Political ties with the Pallava dynasty were strong from the late 7th century to the late 9th. The c. 9th-century image-house at Nalanda, 19 km south of Dambulla, is a magnificent and classic monument drawing on Pallava models. It is comprised of an inner barrel-vaulted cella with a well-decorated open stone maṇḍapa (hall) and an outer circumambulation path. The elevations of the barrel-vaulted shrine are elaborately decorated especially on the north and the south exteriors; the latter retains a figure of Kubera. The rest of the decorations are of the repetitive type generally seen in Pallava edifices, including caitya (dormer) windows with human figures looking out. A rare relief of an erotic sculpture is seen on the southern basement.
Brick and stone Shiva liṅga shrines and image shrines drawing on Chola models were built mainly during the Chola interregnum (992–1070). Most surviving examples in brick are at Anuradhapura and date from about the 10th century; those in stone are mainly at Polonnaruva and date from the 11th century. In design and façade features the brick and stone structures may not have been all that different, except for decorative details, the stone edifices having more and finer sculpture. However, it is possible that the brick structures were plastered and decorated with relief sculpture and other ornamentation in stucco work, as is seen in the later Buddhist shrines at Polonnaruva.
There are over 20 Shiva liṅga shrines of this period in Sri Lanka, a good example being the Shiva Devale No. 1 at Polonnaruva. Built entirely of stone, it is comprised of a garbhagṛha (cella), antarāla (vestibule) and maṇḍapa (hall). This central structure is enclosed by a boundary wall to form an inner compound, which retained four satellite shrines, each consisting of a small cella and simple entrance. The shrines were dedicated to Ganesha, Skanda and two other deities of the Hindu pantheon. The high wall of the compound has the main entrance to the east. The image shrines were generally similar in plan to the Shiva liṅga shrines. A main difference is that the garbhagṛha had a central pedestal on which the image in worship was placed. There are many such shrines in Polonnaruva, Padaviya, Devinuvara, Trincomalee, Anuradhapura, Jaffna and Munnesvaram.
An unusual Buddha image-house at Velgamvehera in the south of the island is in an eclectic style that can be termed Chola-Sinhala. Inscriptional evidence of the 11th century at the site establishes that the monastic complex was set up by a Tamil ruler. The mixed Chola-Sinhala characteristics of design reflect this clearly. The central element is the garbhagṛha with thick walls (now ruined). The shrine retained a standing Buddha image. The antarāla passage is narrow and the enclosed maṇḍapa with many columns could have carried a roof akin to that of the maṇḍapa of any Chola temple. Instead of a frontal entrance, the open porch has two flights of steps on either side. This inner image-house is flanked by two smaller shrines. A heavy boundary wall enclosed all three units in an unusual way with two service spaces on the sides of the main gate facing the courtyard. The complex has such other structures as the stupa, image-house for a recumbent Buddha image and bodhi-tree shrine (bodhighara), all surrounded by a boundary wall with a gatehouse to the east. The entire complex could be considered a unique example of Chola-Sinhala architecture of the Chola interregnum of the late 10th and 11th century.
Bibliography
- S. Bandaranayake: Sinhalese Monastic Architecture: The Vihāras of Anurādhapura (Leiden, 1974)
- R. Silva: Religious Architecture in Early and Medieval Sri Lanka: A Study of the Thūpa, Bodhimaṇḍa, Uposathaghara and Paṭināghara (diss., Leiden, Rijksuniv., 1988)
- T. Nakagawa, ed.: Ancient Architecture in Sri Lanka: Studies on Planning and Restoration of Temple Architecture in the Late Anuradhapura and Polonnaruva Period (Tokyo, 1991) [Jap. and Eng. text and captions]
- S. Bandaranayake: ‘The Architecture of the Anuradhapura Period, 3rd Century bc to 10th Century ad’, Department of Archaeology, Centenary Commemoration Publication, ed. N. D. Wijesekera, 3 (Colombo, in preparation)
2. Polonnaruva period and early minor kingdoms, 11th–14th centuries.
- Roland Silva
Following the reassertion of Sri Lankan sovereignty in the 11th century, extensive building was carried out at the capital, Polonnaruva, and at other sites. Both brick and stone were used in a style that can be termed Sinhala.
Sinhala brick architecture of the 12th and 13th centuries can be seen at Polonnaruva, Anuradhapura and Panduvasnuvara. The types of edifices included secular and religious: from palace buildings to Buddhist shrines and residences. This is best expressed in the walled city of Polonnaruva with the inner city enclosing the palace and the outer city with the shops and houses of merchants. Outside this walled city to the north was the Buddhist university of the Alahana Parivena with stupas, image-houses, chapter houses, residences, teaching units, refectories, baths and hospitals.
The image-houses of the 12th century were the grandest brick structures in Sri Lanka. The overall plan remained the same as in earlier examples, with garbhagṛha, antarāla and maṇḍapa, but the inner sanctum was vaulted to such a height that it could house a standing Buddha c. 17 m high. The edifice itself had a square vaulted roof and a circumambulatory path. A type of choir-loft on either side, as at the Lankatilaka, suggests a form of ritual where the image was worshipped at different levels such as at the feet, the abdomen and the head. The maṇḍapa retained the narrow stairways to the upper levels. This again was vaulted at a spectacular height. The exteriors were delicately moulded with stucco figures, façades of buildings and other ornaments. The interiors were painted with murals.
The religious residences of the Alahana Parivena were different in design from those of the Anuradhapura period in that they did not follow the ‘five-residence’ (Pali pañcāvāsa) plan but had a modified layout with freer movement between one residential unit (Sinh. pariveṇa) and another. The refectories were centrally placed for easy access, but baths were dispersed among the residences. The hospital was positioned halfway between the two focal elements of the monastery, namely the Rankotvehera and Kirivehera. The centrepiece of the whole monastery was the multi-storey chapter house; the ground floor was used for chapter meetings and the upper floors as residences.
The palace of Parakramabahu I (reg 1153–86) was originally a seven-storey edifice (three storeys surviving). The sizes of the walls and the cavities of beams establish the true scale of the stepped structure, which was surrounded by an outer series of ground-floor rooms for service personnel. The main gate to the east was linked to the latter set of rooms. The entrance to the main edifice leads to a large hall, the audience hall, and at the rear was the stone stairway to the upper floors. The royal council chamber was a special building some distance away from the palace. The baths and the changing pavilion were at a lower level to provide for flowing water.
The inner city has many more buildings yet to be unearthed. The walls are at least 4.5 m wide and have a 2 m-wide parade walk for soldiers. The main gate is to the north with guard-houses on either side. The outer city has the special compound of the Tooth Relic Shrine, the so-called Sacred Quadrangle, which was under the direct protection of the king. Its many edifices include the two relic shrines of two successive kings, a vaṭadāgē with a conical roof, two image-houses, one for a seated and the other for a recumbent image and a bodhighara. In addition, there is a shrine to a bodhisattva and an unusual stepped stupa as seen in North Thailand. Apart from these edifices there is also the Pabuluvehera, which was an earlier stupa enlarged during the Polonnaruva period. The unexcavated houses and shops of the citizens are along the four main roads that extend outwards to the cardinal directions beyond the city gates. The city walls of the outer compound protected this residential area.
The stone architecture of the 12th and 13th centuries is well represented at Polonnaruva, Yapahuva, Dambadeniya, Kurunegala and Galebada. The most spectacular edifice is the vaṭadāgē at Polonnaruva. This has two levels of terraces. The outer compound is only partly covered while the rest is exposed to the elements; the water is drained out through crocodile-like (makara) gargoyles. The upper terrace is surrounded by a stone railing and has a high brick wall with four entrances. The stone terraced interior has a brick wall with four entrances. This extensive space has a brick stupa in the middle with stone altars facing the four directions, each with a granite Buddha image. The artistic climax of the interior are the slender octagonal stone columns with laughing dwarfs depicted running round the pillar capitals. The stone stilts supported a conical timber roof with no centre support; instead, it had a finely carved wooden boss to tie the many rafters reaching this high point. The most unusual edifice is the so-called Nissanka-lata-mandapa from the time of Nissanka Malla (reg 1187–96) with ornate, curvilinear stone columns. Other stone or combined stone-and-brick buildings include the temples of the Tooth Relic, council chambers and bathing ponds at Polonnaruva, the ornamental stairway and inner city wall at Yapahuva, the stairway, city wall and audience hall at Dambadeniya, the council hall at Panduvasnuvara, the vaṭadāgē at Attanagalla, the Bodhikotuva at Beligala, the shrine at Ridivehera and the beautiful bath at Galebada. All these have exquisite plans with many mouldings and ornamentation with human and animal figures. The stone columns all have delicately sculpted capitals. Most edifices in stone were roofed with timber frames and terracotta tiles.
Handsome brick, stone and timber architecture of the Gampola period (c. 1341–1411) is found at Lankatilaka, Kandy, Gadaladeniya and Embekke, within c. 3 km of each other. A group of shrines have dual Buddhist and Hindu patronage. Buddhist and Hindu image-houses share the same courtyard at the same level; sometimes the two image-houses sit back to back; at Gadaladeniya the two shrines share the same ambulatory. The shrines at these sites are built from different materials in a variety of styles. The Embekke temple is one of the masterpieces of wood-carving in Sri Lanka (see §VI, 11 below). The stone-clad Gadaladeniya, though weathered, is still a fine spectacle. All these shrines formed the centrepiece to village communities of the 14th century, their activities determining the life and rhythm of the communities.
Bibliography
- S. Bandaranayake: Sinhalese Monastic Architecture: The Vihāras of Anurādhapura (Leiden, 1974)
- R. Silva: ‘Architecture and Integration of Buddhist–Hindu Shrines in Sri Lanka’, Sri Lanka Today, 25 (1978), pp. 21–5
- R. Silva: Religious Architecture in Early and Medieval Sri Lanka: A Study of the Thūpa, Bodhimaṇḍa, Uposathagara and Paṭimāghara (diss., Leiden, Rijksuniv., 1988)
3. Kandyan period, 15th century–1815.
- Nimal de Silva
The disintegration of the kingdom of Kotte during the last part of the 15th century, resulting in many principalities, and the activities of Europeans in the maritime region of the island from the 16th century onwards meant that this period did not provide the political stability required for the development of monumental architecture. Though buildings were smaller, in detail and decoration they exhibited a high degree of craftsmanship. These buildings represented the last examples of the long Sinhalese architectural tradition. European colonial architecture, introduced during the latter part of this period, brought a new dimension to Sri Lankan building (see §III, 4 below).
During this period 13 cities were constructed with palaces, namely Kotte, Kandy (Senkadagalapura), Sitavaka, Rayigama, Aluthnuvara, Medamahanuvara, Nilambenuvara, Peradeninuvara, Hanguranketa, Kundasale, Matale, Badulunuvara and Jaffna. Of these, the largest and best preserved is Kandy, where most buildings are single-storey and constructed around courtyards on terraces set at different levels on the hilly slope. Wood, readily available in the hill country, was an important building material and wood-carving was a major form of architectural decoration (see §VI, 11 below).
Image-houses in the Kandyan region were small, mostly with mud walls. Some were raised on pillared platforms and their walls were decorated with paintings depicting episodes from Buddha’s life and stories of his previous lives. The Dalada Maligava, or Temple of the Tooth, in Kandy, the largest and most important shrine, is a two-storey building of the late 17th century. The materials used in its construction were simple, but owing to the artistic talent of the craftsmen who made it, the building is exceptionally fine. It is decorated with relief carvings in stone, plaster, timber, terracotta, ivory and metal. All possible surfaces are covered with ornate paintings depicting traditional motifs of Kandyan art. The roofing on two levels is hipped and covered with flat clay shingles. The roof of the upper storey is double-pitched and crowned with two gilt-bronze pinnacles. The extended eaves are decorated with a copper valance board. Timber balustrades and pillars of the upper-floor balcony are lacquered in yellow, red and black stripes. The moulded high podium, the pillars on the ground floor and the finely carved doorways are granite, indicating continuity with tradition. In the later part of the 19th century a special type of Buddhist image-house was constructed in the western and southern coastal areas. Large in scale, these image-houses exhibited a mixture of traditional and British colonial architectural characteristics. Their large hipped roofs were covered with semicircular tiles and the ceiling and interior walls were decorated with paintings.
The Magul-maduva, or Audience Hall, in the palace complex at Kandy is a striking example of secular architecture of the Kandyan period. Construction started in 1784. It is an open hall on a moulded, two-level stone plinth (27.5 × 10.8 m). The magnificent double-pitched, flat clay-tiled roof is supported by 64 square timber pillars placed in two double rows forming a wide centre aisle. All the pillars and main beams of the building are richly carved with traditional floral and geometric motifs, and the pillars are capped by carved wooden brackets placed crosswise. The long, projecting rafters also have their undersides carved in rhythmic curves. Of slightly later date is the Pattirippuva, the octagonal structure built by Sri Vikrama Rajasimha (reg 1798–1815) in front of the palace complex, where the King held public audience.
Bibliography
- Culavamsa, Eng. trans. by W. Geiger (London, 1929/R Colombo, 1953)
- R. Percival: An Account of the Island of Ceylon (London, 1805)
- H. W. Cave: The Book of Ceylon (London, 1908)
- A. Coomaraswamy: Mediaeval Sinhalese Art (Broad Campden, 1908/R New York, 1956)
- F. de Queyroz: Conquista temporal e aspiritual de Ceylão (Colombo, 1916); trans. S. G. Perera (Colombo, 1930)
- A. M. Hocart: The Temple of the Tooth in Kandy, Mem. Archaeol. Surv. Ceylon, 4 (London, 1931)
- M. Jonville: ‘MacDowall’s Embassy, 1800’, Journal of the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, 38/1 (1948), pp. 1–21
- A. P. D. Karunatilaka: Senkadagalapura Heritage: A Journal of Southern Sudanese Cultures (Kandy, 1955)
- P. Dolapihille: The Days of Sri Wickramarajasinghe, Last King of Kandy (Colombo, 1959)
- C. E. Godakumbura: Sinhalese Doorways (Colombo, 1966)
- R. Silva: ‘Lessons of Town Planning for Ancient Ceylon’, Journal of the Ceylon Institute of Architects, 1 (1972)
- C. E. Godakumbura: Architecture of Sri Lanka (Colombo, 1976)
- S. Bandaranayake: ‘Sri Lanka and Monsoon Asia: Patterns of Local and Regional Architectural Development and the Problems of the Traditional Sri Lankan Roof’, Studies in South Asian Culture, 7 [Senarat Paranavitana Commemoration Vol.], ed. J. E. van Lohuizen-de Leeuw (Leiden, 1978), pp. 22–44
- A. Seneviratne: Kandy—An Illustrated Survey of Ancient Monuments, with Historical, Archaeological and Literary Descriptions of the City and its Suburbs (Colombo, 1983)
- R. L. Brohier: Changing Face of Colombo (1505–1972) (Colombo, 1984)
- G. S. Wijesuriya: ‘Architectural Heritage of a Lost City—Kotte’, Ancient Ceylon, 6 (1986), pp. 275–314
- T. K. N. P. de Silva: Temple of the Tooth—Kandy (Colombo, 1986)
- A. Seneviratna: An Architectural History of the Daḷadā Māligāwa—The Symbol of Buddhist Faith and Sovereignty in Sri Lanka (Colombo, 1987)
4. Colonial period.
- Ismeth Raheem
For over four and a half centuries of European colonial rule, architecture and urban planning in Sri Lanka were influenced by the cultures of three dominant powers of the West.
(i) Portuguese period, 1505–1656.
In their struggle to win spices, sugar and souls, the Portuguese established footholds along the ancient maritime routes that were traditionally dominated by Arab, Swahili or Indian traders. The first factory (trading centre) was erected at Colombo in 1505. Other strongholds and forts followed along the coast at Galle (1589), Jaffna (1591), Batticaloa (1626) and Trincomalee (1623). At first buildings were enclosed by timber and mud stockades; later these were converted to fortified settlements with stone walls and bastions.
Architecture and urban planning in the Portuguese territories reflected the prevailing design and style in Europe, and particularly in the smaller towns of the Iberian Peninsula. In keeping with 16th-century design the prominent sites of the fortified towns of Colombo, Galle and Jaffna were occupied by religious buildings, including churches, monasteries and orphanages, the domes and bell-towers of which dominated the skyline. Though attempts were made to reproduce Gothic style in some early churches, the effects of the Renaissance in Europe soon led to the development of Baroque architecture. By the mid-17th century this evolved into a highly ornate, florid and heavy style known in the colonies, especially in India and Sri Lanka, as the Indo-Portuguese style. It was Rococo-based with a mixture of Islamic and Indian motifs and an overlay of European designs combined with the Classical orders. Not only was the style prevalent in architecture, it also pervaded all manner of designs, including those for furniture, jewellery and drapery.
Portuguese buildings and fortresses were constructed using indigenous materials and adopting local techniques. Many masonry structures, including forts, warehouses, churches and residences, were built with a type of laterite stone, known as cabook, set in mortar and plastered over with a mixture of lime (powdered coral) and sand. Many such indigenous materials, building techniques and their terms adopted by the Portuguese still continue to be used by artisans and builders in modern Sri Lanka. For example, the Portuguese referred to the defensive walls of a fort as tapia, which has passed into Sinhala as tappe (‘boundary wall’).
(ii) Dutch period, 1656–1796.
Political and social conditions under Dutch rule, which lasted over a century and a half, were for the most part stable, as was reflected in Dutch colonial architecture, which had a lasting impact on the island. The Dutch pragmatic approach to planning continues to influence modern architecture and design.
The Dutch strengthened the existing network of Portuguese fortresses in the ports of Colombo, Galle, Matara, Batticaloa, Trincomalee and Jaffna, and erected a new line of fortresses and strongholds both along the coasts and in the interior, successfully isolating the highland Kandyan kingdom. Such fortifications varied in size, scale and shape. Some measured less than 40 m across and were defended by one or two bastions with troops garrisoned outside the main walls; others, such as Colombo, Galle and Jaffna, resembled fortified military towns. The first half-century of Dutch rule, when most of the fortresses were erected, coincided with the age of formalism in Europe, when the designs and plans of fortified towns were dominated by rules of mathematics and geometry. Large settlements in Sri Lanka were defended by a complex geometric layout of innumerable bastions, moats, gateways and drawbridges. Planned as self-contained units, they were equipped with such amenities as berthing facilities for sailing ships, warehouses, workshops, shipyards, barracks, armouries and powder magazines. Residential units of varying grades were provided for the higher civil and military officials. A church for the small Dutch Presbyterian community was invariably erected within the precincts of the town’s fortification. Some of the best extant examples are those within the forts of Galle (1640), Matara (1679) and Jaffna (1706) (see Military architecture and fortification, fig.). In Colombo the Wolvendaal church (1749), in the fort’s outlying suburbs known as the Pettah, replaced the earlier edifice that was sited within the walls of the fort.
Because Colombo was the administrative centre and its importance in the control of the cinnamon trade was considerable, the Dutch went to extraordinary lengths to ensure that the town was well defended. The planning of Colombo’s fortifications was influenced by the work of the military architect and engineer, Baron Baron Menno van Coehoorn of Holland. Its layout was based on a grid pattern with the town divided into two separate zones referred to by the Dutch as the Kasteel and the Oude Stade. The Kasteel, or citadel, contained the offices and residences of the European community. It was divided into 12 regular blocks with streets intersecting at right angles. The Dutch governor’s residence was one of its most interesting buildings. Remodelled from a complex that originally housed a Portuguese church (the church of Misericordia) and orphanage, it retained some of the exterior architectural elements that characterized the late Indo-Portuguese style, such as decorative balconies and ornate gables. Its elaborately laid-out gardens demonstrated the Dutch interest in horticulture and tropical botany, with pavilions, pools, fountains and flowerbeds, and were landscaped in a manner reminiscent of 18th-century town gardens in the Netherlands. The Oude Stade, or old town, was inhabited by the indigenous population and minor Dutch officials. It included bazaars, shops and other amenities. The street layout of this zone was also planned on a grid pattern of 12 regular blocks. This resulted in long avenues with streets intersecting at right angles. Along each street was a continuous row of single-storey buildings with pitched roofs having low eaves supported by slender timber columns on verandas, which were raised to a considerable height off the street. This deep verandah was approached by a flight of steps leading to immense doorways and windows of over-sized timber members placed axially on the façade. The typical street scene was thus a long sequence of pillars diminishing in the distance in an endless colonnade. The difference between individual buildings was heightened by raising the boundary wall between each in a succession of masonry gables of different convolutions, shapes and sizes. Further individuality was expressed by the use of bright colours on such timber elements as columns, fanlights, doors and windows. Characteristic features of Dutch-period architecture in Sri Lanka are decorative gables, massive doorways, ornamental fanlights and timber colonnaded verandahs with an interplay of Eastern and Western motifs. By the 19th century this hybrid indigenous style flourished along the southern coastal settlements.
(iii) British period, 1796–1948.
The British gained control of Sri Lanka in the last decade of the 18th century. By the first decades of the 19th century, Britain’s superior military technology, naval dominance in the Indian Ocean, economic prosperity and political power gave the small community of British immigrants the confidence to reside outside the defensive walls of fortified towns. New suburbs were laid out, their residents being mainly the higher officials of the civil, judicial and military establishments. Large, commodious bungalows with panoramic views were set in spacious gardens surrounded by several acres of land, the whole reflecting an unhurried lifestyle orientated towards recreation and sport. The bungalow (developed in India from the Bengali hut or bangla to which Western classical building elements were applied) was adapted by civil and military engineers to suit the entire range of building structures for the British community and their dependants, from governor’s house to military mess, club, chummery, resthouse or hotel. The official residences of the President in Colombo and Kandy, formerly the British governors’ houses known as the Queen’s House and Governor’s Pavilion respectively, are fine examples of such an adaptation. In the first decades of British rule they were modest-sized bungalows, but over the years they evolved into larger complexes in a residential building style typical of 19th-century colonial architecture. The first building in British Ceylon signalling the introduction of Neo-classical architecture was aptly called the Doric (1802) and by the mid-19th century this style had been universally adopted. Initially the greater part of the private residences and smaller civic and religious buildings erected in Colombo and outlying suburbs were based on English models, duplicated in Sri Lanka with slight modifications to suit local conditions. A fine example is the chapel (1816) of the Wesleyan Mission, Colombo, a direct adaptation of the Brunswick Chapel in Liverpool.
By the 1850s a large-scale plantation industry had evolved, producing coffee, coconut, tea and rubber. The result was a network of hill stations or provincial towns that grew to be district capitals requiring their own administrative, civil, recreational and religious buildings. Construction at remote sites was facilitated by the introduction in the mid-19th century of prefabricated building components pioneered by engineers in Britain. With the exception of granite stone and timber, all other building materials, such as metal roofing sheets, steel structural members, glass and many decorative materials, were imported from Britain.
Notable architects of the British period include James G. Smithers (1833–1910), Chief Government Architect from 1865 to 1883. Smithers’s designs encompassed a remarkable range of styles and varied in complexity and scale from residential bungalows to larger civic buildings. His most outstanding work, the Colombo National Museum complex (1877), represents one of the finest achievements in 19th-century colonial architecture in South-east Asia. Designed in an Italianate Renaissance style, it is set out majestically in a 12-acre garden site in the residential suburb of Cinnamon Gardens. The two-floor building is ingeniously designed around several courtyards, providing through ventilation, a necessity in a tropical climate, particularly before the advent of electrical or mechanically aided ventilation. This elegant structure is effectively enclosed by an arcaded verandah protecting the building against harsh monsoon rains and glare. The verandah not only provides a functional and practical space, but also aesthetically enhances the building’s appearance. The focal feature is the portico (porte-cochère) from which the building is approached by a flight of steps leading into the entrance lobby lined with Ionic columns. Beyond the lobby is the grand staircase leading to the upper-floor exhibition halls. The shallow pitched roof (originally of tiles, but later covered in corrugated asbestos) is effectively concealed by a parapeted balustrade heightened by pediments over the entrances. The interior, including the floor and ceiling, is exquisitely finished and fitted with local wood. The town hall (1870–73), which Smithers designed for the Colombo Municipal Council in the suburb of Pettah, is a Victorian Gothic composition, one of the finest examples of this style in Sri Lanka.
Another important architectural work of the mid-19th century is the law courts complex at Hulftsdorp, Colombo. It is in Greek Revival style, with commanding Doric pediments symmetrically placed on raised podia overlooking the street. Completed in 1853, the complex consisted of the Supreme Court, the District Court, the Law Library and offices laid around a vast quadrangle with interconnecting passages and verandahs flanked by colonnades. Between 1857 and 1920 further buildings were added, including the Ceylon Law College, built in Renaissance style.
When at the end of the 19th century the rapid development of Colombo’s private sector created a need for banking, commercial and shopping complexes mainly in the Fort area, designers and planners retained many of the aesthetic and practical architectural features of the Dutch and early British period. Many of the buildings were of a homogeneous and uniform character in scale and architectural style with Neo-classical structures dominant. Most were two-storey, laid out with covered pedestrian walkways that gave protection from the tropical sun and monsoon rains. Examples include the Customs Complex (1873), designed by J. G. Smithers and remodelled in 1892 by F. Vine, the Clock Tower (1857, by J. F. Churchill), the Grand Oriental Hotel (1891, by W. A. Turnstall, remodelled in 1911–14 by Stevens & Gregson & Co., Bombay), the General Post Office (1895, by H. F. Tomalin), Cargills Department Store (1902, by E. Skinner) and the Public Works Department offices (1908). Early in the 20th century there was a brief attempt to integrate Islamic, Hindu and some Buddhist architectural elements with European style. One of the finest examples is the Eye Hospital (previously known as Victoria Hospital) at De Soysa Circus, Colombo, designed by E. Skinner of the Public Works Department and completed in 1903. Most civil and public building projects carried out in the early 20th century were designed and constructed by the government’s Public Works Department, including the Secretariat (1923), which was built in Neo-classical style. Other larger projects were passed on to professional firms (rather than the relatively few architects working independently), whose senior partners were mainly British architects. The New Municipal Town Hall (1928) in Colombo, for instance, was built by S. J. Edwards, whose firm was practising in Singapore.
Bibliography
- P. M. Bingham: History of the Public Works Department, Ceylon, 1796–1896, 2 (Colombo, 1922)
- R. L. Brohier: Land Maps and Surveys, 2 vols (Colombo, 1951)
- H. Keuneman: ‘The Forts of Ceylon’, Times Annual (Colombo, 1967)
- R. L. Brohier: Links between Sri Lanka and the Netherlands (Colombo, 1978)
- W. A. Nelson: The Dutch Forts of Sri Lanka (Edinburgh, 1984)
- R. K. de Silva and W. G. M. Beumer: Illustrations and Views of Dutch Ceylon (Leiden, 1988)
5. Modern period.
- Ismeth Raheem
Though Sri Lanka gained its independence in 1948, the stirrings of the modern movement in art and architecture were evident by the first decade of the 20th century. It was a period when the Sri Lankan élite, whether they were politicians, civil servants, scientists, engineers or architects, were educated and trained along Western lines, and there was a readiness to accept models and solutions more suited to European countries than their own. Since their lifestyle was influenced by the West, so was the architecture built by or for them, which reflected European tastes or interests. Among a handful who led a revolt against such a bias and orientation was the art historian and critic Ananda Kentish Coomaraswamy. Of the vast spectrum of subjects he wrote or lectured on, two of his works had a tremendous impact on the attitudes of artists and architects of Sri Lanka, the first the article ‘An Open Letter to the Kandyan Chiefs’ (1905), the second his book Mediaeval Sinhalese Art (1908). Both had a common theme: a plea for the revival of the country’s traditions and a sympathetic attitude towards indigenous art and architecture.
An early example of an architect responding to the plea of Coomaraswamy was Andrew Boyd, who himself influenced and stimulated thinking on modern architecture. He was one of a coterie of intellectual friends that included the great avant-garde photographer Lionel Wendt, the artist George Keyt, and the poet and Nobel laureate Pablo Naruda, who was Chilean Consul from 1929 to 1930. Boyd gave up his career as a tea-taster, studied architecture in London and returned to Sri Lanka in 1937 to immerse himself in his small practice and study indigenous peasant building styles. He designed two residences in Colombo in 1940 and two others in Kandy in 1942 and 1946. Many of his later and larger works were for the London County Council. His writings proved a greater influence on architecture in Sri Lanka than his few buildings on the island. In an article, ‘A People’s Tradition’, the voice of Coomaraswamy is clearly heard. In it Boyd admonished architects who dismissed traditional methods and techniques as primitive. He praised their beautiful and simple style and urged their adoption in present and future designs.
Boyd’s influence is evident in the work of his friend and colleague Minnette de Silva (b 1918), the island’s first woman architect. Her notable early contributions were two residential units, one in Kandy (Karunaratne House, 1950), the other in Colombo (Pieris House, 1953). Both use indigenous materials and motifs in contemporary mode—the characteristic essence of her work. In a residence (1954) built for Asoka Amarasinghe in Colombo, she introduced a central courtyard with the living area around it, reinterpreting the layout of the houses of Kandyan and low-country chieftains and high officials in a novel and modern way. In the residential units of the Senanayake family constructed in the mid-1950s in the residential zone of Cinnamon Gardens in Colombo, she raised the first floor on columns, freeing the ground floor for the use of the residents and providing a carpark. This and other features, such as an open-sided staircase permitting light and free air circulation, roof gardens and balcony terraces doubling as verandahs for living areas, reflect the influence of Le Corbusier, a friend for many years.
The Ceylon Institute of Architects (later the Sri Lanka Institute of Architects) was founded in the late 1950s, providing a common ground for older and younger architects to meet and exchange views. It was also in the late 1950s that two young architects, Geoffrey Bawa and Ulrik Plesner (b 1930), began a collaboration that lasted for almost a decade and influenced a whole generation of architects. Both Bawa, a Sri Lankan, and Plesner, a Dane, were interested in revitalizing the vernacular tradition of architecture. In their formative years working together, they shed the prevalent uniformity of the international idiom that was the hallmark of the 1960s, each developing his own distinct style.
Bawa’s work from 1958 to 1967, the collaborative years with Plesner, was characterized by designs for buildings of a modest and domestic scale. He abandoned heavier reinforced-concrete structures and turned to the simpler timber construction of decorative beams and columns that carried the double-pitched clay-tiled roofs, a feature prevalent in vernacular architecture. The most notable example of this period is the family house in Colombo designed in 1962 for Ena de Silva, a well-known local artist, craftswoman and batik designer.
In the next ten-year period Bawa was occupied with building projects in foreign countries, including the Ceylon Pavilion (1970) for the World Exposition in Osaka, Japan; the Madurai Club (1974) in Madurai, India; and the Hotel Connemara (1976) in Madras, India. Characteristic of his mature work of the 1980s are the new Parliament (1982) at Kotte, near Colombo, and Ruhuna University (1984), Matara. The site for the new Parliament was an island on a marshy stretch of land at Kotte, once the capital of the western district of Sri Lanka. Bawa flooded the marshy area around the island, creating an artificial lake, and constructed a causeway as an approach to the complex. Traditional double-pitched roofs clad in copper and supported by granite and timber columns cover the main assembly hall and side pavilions. Such features are found in the rich traditional architecture of monastic and royal buildings in the ancient city of Anuradhapura, the capital from the 3rd century bc to the 10th century ad. The main General Assembly of the new Parliament rises to three floors and is entered by a succession of monumental doorways sheathed in silver. The landscaping has been carried out in a subtle manner using granite paving in the courtyards, interlaced with indigenous foliage. The overall effect is an integration of traditional building techniques and materials used in a contemporary manner, a hallmark of Bawa’s work. Bawa’s concept for the Ruhuna University Arts and Science Faculties was dictated by the special demands of its spectacular site. The faculty buildings are set on two low hills and the valley between houses the library. The site’s undulating contours have been ingeniously landscaped and an open-air theatre has been carved out of the gently sloping land. The residential buildings are placed on a promontory overlooking the Indian Ocean on one side and the distant inland hills on the other.
Plesner arrived in Sri Lanka in 1958, left in 1968 to practise in England and Israel, and returned in 1981. During his first stay he made an important contribution in the field of architectural education, becoming the cardinal figure in the new school of architecture founded in 1961. Plesner’s work had a clear-cut and fresh approach and appealed to the younger generation of architects. His own house, built in Colombo in 1962, was his most successful small-scale project. It was a maisonette in which he experimented with a double-height living room based on ideas perfected by Le Corbusier in the 1920s and 1930s. Of his larger projects, the Chapel of the Good Shepherd (1963) at Bandarawela probably best expresses his ability to impose a Scandinavian rational approach on indigenous building traditions. While conducting his practice Plesner organized and planned a systematic documentation of traditional buildings of the 17th and 18th centuries on the island that had relevance to the contemporary architecture style he was practising. This project was set up in 1962 and carried out by a team of four: Plesner himself, Laki Senanayake, painter and sculptor, Barbara Sansoni, designer and craftswoman, and Ismeth Raheem.
During the late 1970s and early 1980s Sri Lankans turned to an open economy, which accelerated development programmes and created a building boom in urban renewal, hotel resorts and other schemes. Some of the larger architectural projects were carried out by foreign firms. Notable examples are Grindlays Bank (1982) and the Hotel Lanka Oberoi (1977) and its extension (1984) by the American architectural firm of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. Among civic and public buildings the Supreme Court of Justice and the Bandaranaike Memorial International Conference Hall (1974) are part of an aid programme financed by the Chinese government. In both complexes the design, planning and construction were carried out by Chinese architects, engineers and technicians working in collaboration with the urban development authority of Colombo. The court complex is a structure of unusual, out-of-context architecture in that it is based on features of historic Chinese buildings set in a Sri Lankan urban environment. The more important embassy buildings in Colombo were also designed by architects of foreign origin. The outstanding example is the US Embassy, a four-storey monolithic structure clad in granite and grafted with a sloping tiled roof.
Architects of the 1980s generation noted for their design concepts and novel use of material include Turnour Wickramasinghe (apartments for the delegates of the Non-Aligned Conference, 1974); Nihal Amarasinghe (office and residential flats for Barbara Sansoni, 1980); Pheroze Choksy and Raheem (150-bedroom lodge at Habarana, North Central Province, 1982); and Anura Ratnavibushana (architect’s own house, 1986). All these architects were at one time or another associated with Bawa and Plesner. Thus there are in their work, to varying degrees, features of a regional form of architecture that makes use of traditional building techniques, materials and motifs.
Bibliography
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: ‘An Open Letter to the Kandyan Chiefs’, Ceylon Observer (17 Feb 1905)
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Mediaeval Sinhalese Art (Broad Campden, 1908/R New York, 1956)
- A. Boyd: ‘A People’s Tradition: An Account of the Small Peasant Tradition in Ceylon’, Marg, 1/2 (1947), pp. 25–40
- G. Bawa and U. Plesner: ‘Gamle bygninger på Ceylon’ [Old buildings in Ceylon], Arkitekten [Copenhagen], 16 (1965), pp. 317–30
- G. Bawa and U. Plesner: ‘Arbejder på Ceylon’ [Workings in Ceylon], Arkitekten [Copenhagen], 17 (1965), pp. 337–60
- M. Brawne: ‘Bawa in Context’, Architectural Review [London], 163 (April 1978), pp. 208–21
- B. B. Taylor: Geoffrey Bawa: Architect in Sri Lanka (Singapore, 1986)
IV. Sculpture.
Most, but not all, Sri Lankan sculpture is religious—mainly Buddhist, but also including some equally fine representations of Hindu gods and goddesses. Materials include stone, carved in relief (in some instances rock-cut) and in the round; stucco and brick; metal; wood; and ivory.
1. Early Anuradhapura period, c 3rd century bc–early 7th century ad.
- Diran Kavork Dohanian
Sri Lanka’s historical mythology equates civilization with the religion of the Buddha and defines, as a key historical pivot, that moment in the middle of the 3rd century bc when the king of Anuradhapura received an embassy from Ashoka Maurya and accepted the gift carried by them of the Buddhist faith and its institutions. But it is clear that there had already developed among the racially mixed peoples of the island structured societies, each centred upon the person and governance of a king or prince, with the kingdom of Anuradhapura pre-eminent among them. The establishment of a Buddhist kingdom at Anuradhapura did not bring civilization to Sri Lanka but determined, in a most crucial and enduring manner, the future shape and character of a culture already sufficiently established and receptive to rapid modified growth. If Ashoka Maurya’s ‘Buddhist Imperium’ provided the typological model for the kings of Sri Lanka, the practical examples were found in the contemporaneously developing civilizations of the Andhradesha, closer at hand on the Indian subcontinent, in the Vengi region of the eastern Deccan.
The royal city of Anuradhapura, the centre of political and religious life, was also the principal repository of monumental material remains. But the continuous habitation of the city over more than a millennium, punctuated by the ravages of war, by restoration, and by the normal processes of decay and rebuilding, has obscured the evolutionary stages of cultural expression, especially in the visual arts. Added to this is the habit, developed at an early stage, of the reuse of earlier components and fragments in later constructions. As a result, a strict chronology of the earliest surviving sculptural remains is difficult to determine.
Among the oldest extant carvings are the limestone columns, rectilinear in section and topped by sculptured figures of animals, that bind and finish the forward corners of the vāhalkaḍas (Sinh.: rectilinear projections from the high circular base, equidistant from each other) of the Kantaka Chetiya, one of the main dāgabas at Mihintale. Those of the eastern vāhalkaḍa, together with the short carved slabs that abut them, are probably the earliest in the group that dates from the late 1st century to early 2nd century ad.
The exposed faces of the pillars and slabs are carved in low relief and recessed within bands that are generally unarticulated. The motifs and symbols, taken from the common lore of South Asian mythology, are varied and multiple, but the dominant signs are the pūrṇaghaṭa (Skt: vase-of-plenty) and the nāga (serpent), and the principal theme is plenitude existentially specified in terms of the flora and fauna of the world. The sculptural forms are disengaged from the slab by their contours, which are slightly rounded, and by simple modulation of the surface plane, minimally in the case of the earlier examples and with a restricted play of levels later.
In Anuradhapura, at the Abhayagiri Dāgaba, a slab with the compressed shape of a makara (crocodile-like creature) demonstrates this simple method of form definition in relief-carving. It may be dated c. ad 100. Carved stone pillars similar in design to those at Mihintale adorned the vāhalkaḍas of the great stupas at the Abhayagiri and Jetavana monasteries and at the Dakkhina Thupa. In these examples dating from the 2nd and 3rd centuries, the depth of relief-carving is greater, the contours and modulated planes that define and characterize the form are more richly varied, and the illusion of volume in organic shapes is substantially enhanced. The nāga is rendered anthropomorphically, setting the standard for its use among later generations, and is characterized as male and female. Anthropomorphic terms also provide the framework for new motifs: cakravastin (universal monarch), gana (dwarf–attendant) and prince.
Little carving in the round from the early period has survived, but three large-scale, free-standing images of the Buddha from Maha Ilupallama, Kuccaveli and the Ruvanvelisaya at Anuradhapura may be dated to this time. All show the Buddha standing bolt upright with monk’s robe (sanghātī) draped to bare the right shoulder and with the right hand, where it has survived, raised in the gesture of assurance known as abhaya mudrā. The style of the images is constant: the figure is strictly frontal; the width of shoulders and hips is roughly the same; the shapes of the body are simply and broadly fashioned, underscoring an effect of density and mass; the curve of the body contours is restrained; the surfaces are subtly articulated to animate the form, but the shapes beneath the drapery are scarcely revealed through it; and the robe is draped in folds that run obliquely across the body in an ordered rhythm of slightly convex wide and narrow bands. A heavy, billowing fold near the ankles is a distinguishing feature. This style resonates with that of the workshops of the Vengi region of India, especially of the monasteries at Nagarjunakonda during the early decades of the 4th century. The Sri Lankan images may be dated to roughly the same time.
Bibliography
- D. T. Devendra: Classical Sinhalese Sculpture: 300 B.C.–1000 A.D. (London, 1958)
- N. Wijesekera: Early Sinhalese Sculpture (Colombo, 1962)
- U. von Schroeder: Buddhist Sculptures of Sri Lanka (Hong Kong, 1990)
2. Later Anuradhapura period, late 7th century–late 10th.
- Diran Kavork Dohanian
The political fortunes of the kings of Sri Lanka were intermeshed with those of the Pallava dynasty of south India from the late 7th century ad and the intercultural foci of the Sinhalese shifted, though not entirely, from the Vengi region in the Deccan to Tondaimandalam. (The Pallava link was forged when the Sinhalese prince Manavamma was given asylum at the Pallava court at Kanchipuram and later Pallava naval and military aid to win the throne of Anuradhapura in the year 684.) The practical consequences of this alliance, which was broken only on the extinction of Pallava power in the last years of the 9th century, were an unparalleled prosperity coupled with an effective exercise of political power never before realized in Sri Lanka. All the factors were in place for the nourishment and evolution of a brilliant, richly endowed civilized life of which the surviving sculptural remains provide concrete evidence.
Chief among these is the most celebrated Sinhalese stone image of the Buddha, carved early in the 8th century as part of a Mahayana Buddhist shrine within the precincts of the Abhayagiri Monastery at Anuradhapura. The Buddha (in situ) of the Outer Circular Road, as it is designated, gives form to the new vision stimulated by the political and cultural interdependence of Sri Lanka and the Pallava empire. Its broad, summary shapes and smooth surface, the tall, tapered torso and tapering arms, the crisp edges given to brows and lips, and the sinuous outline of the downcast eyes all accord with the formulae characteristic of nearly contemporary Pallava carving at Mamallapuram. An overwhelming sobriety is induced by the disciplined tautness of the surface planes, which, though supple, never border on the fleshy and, though varied, never dissipate the overall sense of grand simplicity.
Of slightly earlier date and affirmatively Mahayanist in theme is a monumental standing image of the bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara (h. c. 2.29 m) carved from gneiss and discovered among the ruins of an image-house at Situlpavuva in south-eastern Sri Lanka. In its visual rhetoric, this image may suggest an earlier stage in the evolution of the expressive style of the Abhayagiri Buddha, but it affirms the currency of that new style in clear terms. The convex planes and cylindrical forms that shape its integral parts melt imperceptibly into one another. The surface plane is continuous and taut and moves along its various levels with controlled regularity. The contours fluctuate in movements contrived to compensate each other, and the bodily shapes are crisply articulated where the smooth curving planes conjoin. Yet the formal tensions thus produced are uniformly distributed so that the total effect is one of an extraordinary and even balance. The iconography is exceptional in that it represents the bodhisattva as an ascetic rather than a prince. Introduced to Sri Lanka from Tondaimandalam late in the 7th century, this was the dominating type of Sinhalese image of Avalokiteshvara until as late as the 10th century.
Indian models of the Vengi region were not, however, completely eclipsed, even in the service of progressive theology. Fresh impetus primarily from workshops at Buddhist centres revived by the patronage of the Chalukyas of Vengi stimulated the reshaping of conventional Sinhalese styles. The colossal Buddha at Aukana, carved from the living rock in the 8th century, once housed in a square sanctum that fronted it, is a stunning example of this. The image (h. c. 13.1 m), standing on a double lotus, was carved almost completely in the round. It is the earliest of many colossi that culminated in the celebrated group at Polonnaruva (see §IV, 3 below), the Gal Vihara, and embodies the Mahayana concept of the transmundane character of the Buddha, Lokottara. In its strict frontality and massive form, with the shapes of the body broadly and simply fashioned, the image perpetuates the Early Anuradhapura style, as does the general disposition of drapery folds in the depiction of the garment. The volumes, however, are decidedly more full and fleshy, the shapes of the body are clearly distinguished beneath the drapery, the line where the lower garment presses into the abdomen is emphatically rendered, and the body proportions have shifted, with shoulders markedly broader than hips. These features also distinguish contemporary imagery from Eastern Chaluyka domains in the Vengi region.
To a large extent this type of Buddha image provided a coequal alternate model for all subsequent Buddha imagery in Sri Lanka and the primary basis for the distinctive style of Polonnaruva. A small metal image from Toluvila with the Buddha seated in meditation on a double lotus (Anuradhapura, Archaeol. Mus.), dating from the end of the 8th century, refines the Aukana idiom and prefigures the Buddha imagery of the 12th century. Bodhisattva imagery, on the other hand, develops the sculptural manner of Manavamma’s reign and, through the modes seen in late 8th- to early 10th-century metal images such as the Vajrasattva from Medirigiriya and the Avalokiteshvara from Basavakkulam, provides the formal ground in which all non-Buddha images of Polonnaruva later flourished. The Basavakkulam image, which manifests the final developed stages of the Pallava/Sinhala sculptural manner, also prefigures the sculptural idiom of the Indian Chola dynasty. The lithe, elegant shapes of the anatomy, locked in tightly integrated and motionless planes, contrast with the mannered movements of surface details which are given a separate existence. The rippling patterns of plastically executed ornaments, sashes and drapery become in Chola art lightly raised linear systems pressed against the regular and hard surfaces of the basic form. The oval lips, sharp nose and crisp line of the brow in the Basavakkulam image become stylized even further in the Chola idiom.
Bibliography
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Bronzes from Ceylon, Mem. Colombo Mus., Series A, 1 (Colombo, 1914)
- D. T. Devendra: Classical Sinhalese Sculpture: 300 B.C.–1000 A.D. (London, 1958)
- N. Wijesekera: Early Sinhalese Sculpture (Colombo, 1962)
- D. K. Dohanian: ‘The Colossal Buddha at Aukana’, Archives of the Chinese Art Society of America, 19 (1965), pp. 16–25
- C. A. Wijesekera: ‘Bronze Casting in Ceylon’, Journal of the National Museums of Ceylon, 1 (Colombo, 1965)
- D. K. Dohanian: The Mahayana Buddhist Sculpture of Ceylon (New York and London, 1977)
- D. K. Dohanian: ‘Sinhalese Sculptures in the Pallava Style’, Archives of Asian Art, 36 (1983), pp. 6–21
- U. von Schroeder: Buddhist Sculptures of Sri Lanka (Hong Kong, 1990)
3. Chola interregnum and Polonnaruva period, late 10th century–early 13th.
- Diran Kavork Dohanian
The final, devastating consequence of Manavamma’s alliance with the Pallavas was the invasion and pillage of Sri Lanka by their south Indian enemies, first the Pandyas and then the Cholas, who by the 10th century were the dominant south Indian power. Rajendra I (reg 1012–44) destroyed Anuradhapura in 922 and annexed the northern part of the kingdom as a province of the Chola empire. In 1017 he completed the conquest of Sri Lanka and established a capital at the second royal city, Polonnaruva. State patronage of Buddhist institutions declined under Chola government, but temples dedicated to Shiva were established in the new capital and were generously endowed. Substantial hoards of Shaiva metal images, buried in the precincts of these temples at the time of their abandonment, offer effective testimony to the high quality of civilized life established and sustained by the Cholas, at least in the stronghold–city of Polonnaruva. The full range of iconic types associated with the worship of Shiva is found in these survivors. Splendid images of Nataraja (Shiva as Lord of Dance), Ganesha and the goddess Kali and many effigies of Shaiva saints suggest the large volume and high technical quality of image production under Chola patronage. While some of these images may be the work of craftsmen who came from Tamil Nadu with the Chola conquerors, a significant number of them are clearly the work of local image-makers working in the traditions of the Later Anuradhapura workshops but expressing Hindu themes.
A counter-insurgency against Chola rule and a protracted war of liberation, coupled with the waning of Chola power at home, resulted in the restoration of a Sinhalese dynasty to the throne of Sri Lanka in 1070. Vijayabahu I was crowned in Anuradhapura but retained Polonnaruva as the administrative centre of government. His successors Parakramabahu I (reg 1153–86) and Nissanka Malla (reg 1187–96) engaged in ambitious public works that shaped the city and its culture in a rush of activity over a short space of time. The surviving sculpture of the era must be assigned to the reigns of these monarchs.
Anuradhapura was restored, partly as a political exercise and partly to reaffirm links with a splendid Sinhalese past. Parakramabahu redefined the Ruvanveliseya by facing the grand terrace with a retaining wall that was sculpted in brickwork and stucco with elephants, nearly life-size and facing outward. Though the elephants were ruined and reconstructed clumsily, the compelling force of their original naturalism can be seen in contemporary elephant figures that formed the oil reservoirs for hanging metal lamps found among the relic-chamber deposits in the stupa at Dedigama, Parakramabahu’s birthplace. Also found in that stupa were small seated Buddha figures, framed by makara toraṇas (arches formed of crocodile-like creatures). Fashioned from beaten and shaped gold sheet, these figures draw on the Aukana colossus style in its 9th-century variations.
In Polonnaruva itself this mode is clearly seen, fully evolved, in the four colossal Buddhas cut from the living rock at the Gal Vihara (for illustration see Polonnaruva). The broad, swelling shapes of the anatomy combine with the animated pulsations of the drapery schema to evoke, in brilliant counterpoint, both sobriety and sensuality. A distinctive facial type also develops—a hallmark of its style—in which the mathematically regular oval of the face is articulated by a long nose and emphatically arched brows, with the eyes placed high and fairly close together. This scheme, in progressively debased and inert patterns, determined the iconometry of all later Buddha images in Sri Lanka.
Bibliography
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Bronzes from Ceylon, Memoirs of the Colombo Museum, Series A, 1 (Colombo, 1914)
- Ceylon Historical Journal, 4/1–4 (1954–5) [Special number on the Polonnaruva per. issued in commemoration of the 800th anniversary of the accession of King Parākrama Bahu]
- M. B. Ariyapala: Society in Medieval Ceylon (The State of Society in Ceylon as Depicted in the Saddharma-ratrāvaliya and Other Literature of the Thirteenth Century) (Colombo, 1956)
- W. Geiger: Culture of Ceylon in Mediaeval Times, ed. H. Bechert (Wiesbaden, 1960)
- N. Wijesekera: Early Sinhalese Sculpture (Colombo, 1962)
- C. E. Godakumbura: Polonnaruva Bronzes, Art Series 5 (Colombo, 1964)
- C. A. Wijesekera: ‘Bronze Casting in Ceylon’, Journal of the National Museums of Ceylon, 1 (Colombo, 1965)
- D. K. Dohanian: ‘The “Elephant Wall” of the Ruanveli Dagoba at Anuradhapura’, Ars Orientalis, 8 (1970), pp. 139–46
- D. K. Dohanian: The Mahayana Buddhist Sculpture of Ceylon (New York and London, 1977)
- U. von Schroeder: Buddhist Sculptures of Sri Lanka (Hong Kong, 1990)
4. Kandyan period and other minor kingdoms, 13th century–1815.
- Diran Kavork Dohanian
The massive investment of resources by the kingdom in grand programmes of construction and display impaired Polonnaruva’s economic strength. This, in tandem with the internecine rivalries endemic in the politics of ancient Sri Lanka, set in motion a rapid decline following the reign of Nissanka Malla (reg 1187–96). Once again, a vulnerable kingdom was attacked, occupied and pillaged by armies from south India. With the consolidation of a Tamil kingdom in the north of the island and the abandonment of Polonnaruva by the Sinhalese, rival and minor princes ruled, with diminished resources, from the rock fortresses of Dambadeniya (c. 1232–72), Yapahuva (c. 1272–84) and Kurunegala (c. 1293–1341); from the naturally protected sites in the inland mountains, Gampola (c. 1341–1411) and Kandy (c. 1480–1815); and from the fortified towns in the south and west coastal regions, Kotte (c. 1411–1597) and Sitavaka (c. 1521–94).
Little survives of the material culture of the minor kingdoms with the exception of the kingdom of Kandy where the sculptural production is represented by numbers of small-scale images in metal, ivory and wood; larger-scale images built up of a variety of materials and finished in modelled stucco and colours; and carved wooden architectural components and some counterparts carved in granite. The dominant feature of this art is the mechanical regularity of its design and conformation and the relentless infusion of the simplifications of form and pattern characteristic of village art within surfaces ornamented by a fussy complexity of detail mechanically distributed. One cannot speak of continuity in sculptural workshop traditions, given the unsettled circumstances of life over scores of generations and the definitive dislocation from the splendid past, but in the best of the surviving sculptures something more than folksy charm and decorative allure persists. This is perhaps, in part, the consequence of contact with fragments of the past through the periodic refurbishment of sacred places and images.
Carved stone panels among the remains of the citadel in the rock-fortress of Yapahuva, built by Bhuvanekabahu I (reg 1272–84), and panels carved in the wooden framing of the entrance to the Vishnu Devale of the monastery at Aludenuya, given by Bhuvanekabahu IV (reg 1341–51), show male and female figures of uniformly broad, simple volumes with wide shoulders and hips, narrow waists and swelling thighs. Elements of garment and body ornaments, also simply shaped, sit heavily upon these volumes. The mechanical action is overstated as are the expressive gestures—where visible—of eyes and lips. Though the volumes have some three-dimensional force, the carving as a whole is fairly shallow. A seated Buddha carved over the doorway at Yapahuva is similarly conceived and shaped, but the garment lies flat on the volumes of the body, with no indication of the gather and fall of the cloth. A smooth panel indicates the folded robe (sanghātī) resting on the left shoulder and breast. This formula sustained the manufacture of Buddha images, seated and standing, during the following centuries, as is clearly shown in the icon of the 14th-century monastery at Ganegoda, rock-cut and finished in plaster and colours, and is substantially obscured in the similar icon at Gadaladeniya (1344; rest. 18th century). The smooth-robe convention in Buddha images persisted until the early decades of Kandy sovereignty in the 16th century, when a peculiar mode of Kandy vision takes over and undulating ridges or grooves, closely spaced and often frenetically rhythmic, formulate the description of the gathers and fold of the cloth covering the Buddha’s body. A similar freezing of iconometric conventions shapes every factor that makes up the Kandy style.
Still, sporadic outbursts of cultural vitality, stimulated by a relatively secure state, produced occasionally in the highlands kingdom a rush of sculpture production in a mature if not sophisticated style. Only during the reigns of Kirti Sri Rajasimha (reg 1747–82) and his son, Rajadhirajasimha (reg 1782–98), were conditions ripe for a sudden expansion of royal patronage of religion and the arts. Grand programmes for the refurbishment of established shrines, the founding of monasteries and the offering of newly manufactured images are attributed to Rajasimha. The 18th-century cave shrines of the Maharajalena at Dambulla and a seated Buddha—in gilt bronze with details picked out in colour—at Bambarende are telling examples of his generosity. A similar striking metal image, with the Buddha figure topped by a s̄irispoṭa (5-part flame) and seated in vīrāsana on a double-lotus throne, was given by Rajadhirajasimha in 1787 to the Danagirigala Monastery at Dodantale. Each of the gilded metal images was placed in an elaborate structure with a stepped rectangular base and arching makara toraṇa, made of carved and painted wood in the earlier example and bronze (not gilded and cast in several parts) in the latter. These images represent the end of a long tradition of cultural expression in Sri Lanka.
Bibliography
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Mediaeval Sinhalese Art (Broad Campden, 1908/R New York, 1956)
- N. Mudiyanse: The Art and Architecture of the Gampola Period (Colombo, 1967)
- A. Liyanagamage: The Decline of Polonnaruva and the Rise of Dambadeniya (Colombo, 1968)
- K. Indrapala, ed.: The Collapse of the Rajarata Civilisation in Ceylon and the Drift to the South West (Peradeniya, 1971)
- S. Pathmanathan: The Kingdom of Jaffna, Part I (Circa A.D. 1250–1450) (Colombo, 1978)
- A. Seneviratna: Golden Rock Temple of Dambulla (Colombo, 1984)
- U. von Schroeder: Buddhist Sculptures of Sri Lanka (Hong Kong, 1990)
5. Colonial and modern periods.
- Albert Dharmasiri
A decline in sculpture is evident from the time of the British conquest of Kandy in 1815 and the establishment of British rule on the island. This is in part a reflection of constraints on the patronage of Buddhist monasteries and temples. The British did not fund Buddhist religious institutions; it has been argued that they actively discouraged the practice of Buddhism. However, late in the 19th century new temples were built in various parts of the island: for example the Rajamaha Vihara (1886) at Kotte and the Subhadrarama Vihara (also 1886) at Totagamuva. The sculptures of such temples, which overwhelmingly convey the spiritual power and transcendence of the Buddha, represent the last phase of the Kandyan school (see §IV, 4 above).
A new development in turn-of-the-century Buddhist sculpture reflects an ill-conceived synthesis of Victorian and indigenous concepts. Maligawage Sarlis (1880–1955; see also §V, 2, (v) below) popularized this pseudo-realistic idiom with its tendency towards the decorative and ornamental at the expense of sculptural values. He invented brightly painted sculptural tableaux of Buddhist stories with standing life-size figures, setting a new trend in Buddhist sculpture.
Sri Lankan sculpture in the 20th century falls into two main categories: traditional work, under the patronage of temples, on predominantly Buddhist themes that form part of the continuum dating back to the 1st century ad; and individual work created by sculptors, often trained at art schools, who are affected by international contemporary art movements. The latter group has been fostered by such bodies as the Ceylon Society of Arts, born originally of British patronage in 1891, the 43 Group (see also §V, 2, (v) below) formed in 1943 and the Government College of Fine Arts established in 1953.
Development of sculpture in Sri Lanka is linked with the awareness of the necessity of a modern cultural identity in building up an independent sovereign nation. Yet, one of the most surprising phenomena is the lack of a sculptural equivalent to the dynamic manifestations of contemporary painting (see §V, 2, (v) below).
One exception is the contribution of Tissa Ranasinghe (b 1925). Ranasinghe studied first at the Government College of Fine Arts, Colombo, then at the Chelsea School of Art, London; he was the first Sri Lankan sculptor to be exposed to the influence of modern sculpture developments in England. His works are characterized by a feeling for simplified form and expressive content. Ranasinghe has worked in a wide variety of media: his sculpture Penance (h. 765 mm; 1957; Colombo, Anton Wickremasinghe priv. col.) is in aluminium, his work includes copper sculptures for the Industrial Exhibition in 1965 and a terracotta relief (c. 8×3.6 m) for the entrance lobby of the Galle Face Hotel in Colombo, and he was the first Sri Lankan sculptor of modern times to cast in bronze. His bronze statues of Sri Lankan political leaders made as public monuments include one of D. S. Senanayake, Sri Lanka’s first prime minister, in front of the Presidential Secretariat in Colombo (h. c. 2.6 m), and life-size figures of such other former prime ministers as S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike, Dudley Senanayake and Sir John Kotelawala, made for the Sri Lankan government. Bronze portrait heads of personalities in the fields of culture and the arts include those of archaeologist Senarat Paranavitana, actress Annie Boteju, actor Romlas de Silva and singer H. W. Rupasinghe (e.g. Colombo, A.G.). Works with a religious theme include several bronzes: a Buddha (h. c. 2.4 m), a monk and a nun (both h. 0.9 m), and five bronze reliefs depicting the life of the Buddha (all produced from the Ceylon Pavilion at Expo ’67 in Montreal; now at the Sri Lanka Buddhist Vihāra in Washington, DC). Tissa Ranasinghe’s language of sculpture is a continuation of the national tradition in a modern idiom. A young sculptor recognizable as a successor to Ranasinghe is Sarath Chandrajeewa (b 1955), whose forte is portrait heads in bronze. Other sculptors producing interesting work include Pushpananda Weerasinghe (b 1942) and Leela Peries, who sculpted the bronze Christ (h. 3.7 m) at the entrance to the Tewatte Basilica at Ragama.
Bibliography
- P. N. Maddegoda: ‘Exhibition of Tissa Ranasinghe’s Sculpture’, Ceylon Today, 7/2 (Dec 1959), pp. 8–13
- M. Wickremasinghe: Buddhism and Culture: A Sculptor of Promise (Colombo, 1964)
- L. P. Goonetilleke: ‘The Ceylon Pavilion in Montreal (Expo’ 67): A Gem among Giants’, Ceylon Today, 16/3 (March 1967), pp. 11–19
- M. Wickremasinghe: Buddhism and Art (Colombo, 1971)
- Tissa Ranasinghe: Exhibition of Bronze Sculpture (exh. cat., Colombo, Lionel Wendt Mem. A.G., 21–9 Oct 1971)
- A. Dharmasiri: ‘Modern Art in Sri Lanka’, The Anton Wickramasinghe Collection (Colombo, 1988)
V. Painting.
The decoration of interior wall surfaces of cave dwellings of the saṅgha (Pali: community of monks) appears to have been introduced into Sri Lanka with the formal adoption and spread of Buddhism. In this early period, according to the monastic code of discipline (vinaya), the walls of monastic caves were not only plastered with clay mixes, but were permitted decoration with certain motifs. The Buddhist Pali scriptures and annals of the early monasteries in Anuradhapura indicate a knowledge and practice of painting that had a religious content (de Silva).
According to the Buddhist theory of matter, the eye perceives, through colour (vaṇṇa), the changes of colour and the confining of colour by means of lines (form or rūpa), certain images that give rise in the mind to consciousness (viññāṇa). Thus the contemplation of a painting evokes a message in the mind. The purpose of painting was to convey a message to the viewer; from the invariable subject-matter of extant paintings of almost all periods in Sri Lanka, it is evident that their most common purpose was to direct the mind of the viewer to the life and previous lives of the Buddha. A continuous tradition lives on, spanning more than 2000 years of painting on the walls of cave shrines and temples. Sri Lanka also has a tradition of painting on the wooden covers of manuscripts and on cloth banners (see fig. below).
1. Materials and techniques.
- Raja de Silva
The earliest paintings, in caves in ancient Buddhist sites, are executed on grounds of brown clay incorporating chopped plant material and vegetable gums. Such grounds were prepared for painting by the application of a wash of lime. Examples of this earliest technique survive in a damaged state at the cave sites of Kandalama and Dambulla in Central Province and Kotiyagala in Uva Province. This technique was continued for about 600 years to reach maturity around the middle of the Anuradhapura period (i.e. c. ad 500) when the use of a ground based on lime gained ascendancy. About the 8th century ad the tradition of using a brown clay ground was becoming obsolete, giving way to a more confident use of a thicker lime ground. In the 18th century a marked change in the composition of the ground and the paints was effected. For the former thin white layers of kaolin were generally used; traditional earth yellows and reds were replaced by orpiment and cinnabar. The style of painting also changed: red or black monochromatic backgrounds became common; figures were flat and largely in profile; themes were conveyed in a narrative form in rectangular framed registers. Tempera techniques using gum or oil or an oil/lacquer were used, and certain areas of paintings were varnished. Surviving examples of manuscript painting are late. Typically, illustrations were executed in opaque colour on wooden covers. Text folios are rarely illustrated, but occasionally simple pictures were incised and inked on the palm-leaf surface of the page.
Bibliography
- R. H. de Silva: ‘The Technique of Ancient Sinhalese Wall Painting—Sīgiri’, Paranavitana Felicitation Volume, ed. N. A. Jayawickrama (Colombo, 1965), pp. 89–121
2. Historical survey.
(i) The early tradition: Sigiriya.
- Raja de Silva
The only extensive remains of early paintings are those at Sigiriya, executed in the 5th–6th centuries ad (and roughly contemporary with much of the wall painting at Ajanta). Some 17 female figures are preserved in a 20 m-long pocket sheltered by overhanging rock. It appears a much larger area of the rock face was once covered with paintings; drip ledges have been cut above and patches of ground still cling to the crevices. An unusual feature is the location of the paintings on the exposed western face of the rocky outcrop some 120 m above the surrounding ground level (rather than on the walls of a shrine). At the summit of the outcrop is a series of gardens with a large bathing pond, wells, rock-cut throne, two pavilions and a dāgaba, probably built by Kassapa I (reg 479–97), who made Sigiriya his resort and might have commissioned the paintings.
The subject of this enchanting remnant of a once thriving painting tradition has been debated for the last century. The narrow-waisted female figures with ample, round breasts are veiled to the hip by clouds and set against a buff background representing the sky. Dark skin tones were used for those bearing trays of flowers and golden skin tones for others, often depicted holding blossoms. The scene was first identified as royal women proceeding with their attendants to a Buddhist temple to the north of the rock (Bell). It was later convincingly argued that the figures represented divine females or apsarasas (Coomaraswamy). Another theory interpreted the dark women as cloud damsels (Skt meghalatās) and the golden women as lightning princesses (vijjukumārīs). In this view Kassapa’s intention was to promote the politico-religious concept of the god-king (devarāja) dwelling on top of a mountain and surrounded by semi-divine beings, like the god Kubera on the holy mountain Alaka in the Himalayas (Paranavitana, 1947, 1961). The latest interpretation of the figures is that they represent the goddess Tara, the saviouress of the Mahayana Buddhist pantheon, in her yellow, green and red manifestations (de Silva, 1990). The painters’ conception of female beauty is consistent with the standards of Sinhalese literature written some 700 years later: eyes wide and long, skin (in many cases) golden like the champak flower, palms painted red, blossoms decorating the hair, three folds of flesh in the region of a narrow waist. A single flower is depicted falling from the hand of one figure, and it is likely that the intention was to convey the impression of divine females among the clouds dropping an occasional blossom or two upon mortals below.
Stylistically the paintings are characterized by clarity and boldness in line and colour. That the draughtsmanship was freehand is evident from altered contours and gestures. A striking feature is the individuality of some figures. Painters used a variety of techniques in modelling the rounded female forms, including varying tones of colour, hatching and concentric linework. Movement was captured by the effective positioning of the bodies. Arms are foreshortened creating a sense of depth and perspective. In addition, the background area behind the figures is subtly shaded in buff hues, diminishing the glare and imparting to an otherwise flat surface the illusion of three-dimensional space.
Extensive preparations were carried out before the paintings were executed. A knee-deep drain was cut along the western brow of the rock and the drip ledges carved out lower down to prevent the overflow of rain water on to the surface of the paintings in the large area below. The rock surface was pitted to provide a key to the first of several layers of ground, consisting of brown clay mixed with paddy husks and chopped straw, with the binding medium an emulsion of vegetable gum and a drying oil. For the second layer freshly burnt lime (derived from a limestone outcrop in the vicinity of Sigiriya) was mixed with a light coloured clay and sand. The same binding medium was used. A coat of lime plaster without the addition of clay but otherwise similarly mixed was applied over this and trowelled smooth. A master painter then drew the outlines with bold brushwork in red ochre. A thin wash of lime was brushed over, its white colour toned down by still another wash of a buff-coloured suspension of clay and lime. On this the painter outlined the design using such colours as black, red or even light yellow. The pigments were the traditional colours of the ancients in wall painting: red ochre, yellow ochre and green earth (terra verde). Black was provided by carbon, white was rendered in lime, and off-white and straw to buff colours were clays. Orange hues were obtained by mixing red and yellow, and dark red shades were achieved by mixing black with red. The medium was an emulsion of vegetable gum and drying oil.
The beauty of the paintings is extolled in a profusion of graffiti inscribed on the plastered surface of a long gallery wall protecting the main approach to the summit of the rock. Descriptions recorded there indicate that as many as 100 female figures originally adorned the rock face. Several verses from the 13th century remark on the deterioration of the paintings that had by then set in (Paranavitana, 1956).
Bibliography
- H. C. P. Bell: Archaeological Survey of Ceylon, Annual Report (1897), p. 14
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Mediaeval Sinhalese Art (Broad Campden, 1908/R New York, 1956), p. 178
- S. Paranavitana: ‘The Subject of the Sigiri Paintings’, India Antiqua (Leyden, 1947), p. 264
- S. Paranavitana: Sigiri Graffiti, 2 vols (Oxford, 1956)
- S. Paranavitana: ‘The Significance of the Paintings of Sigiri’, Artibus Asiae, 24 (1961), pp. 382–7
- R. H. de Silva: Evolution of the Technique of Sinhalese Wall Painting (diss., Oxford U., 1962)
- S. Bandaranayake: The Rock and Wall Paintings of Sri Lanka (Colombo, 1986)
- R. de Silva: Painting Section 1 (Early Period 247 bc to ad 800), 44 of Archaeological Department Centenary (1890–1990), Commemoration Series, ed. N. D. Wijesekera, v (Colombo, 1990), p. 3
(ii) 8th–14th centuries.
- Siri Gunasinghe
Remains of wall paintings datable to the 8th century and after have been discovered in a number of cave shrines and in the relic-chambers of stupas at Buddhist centres away from major cities that escaped the general disruption caused by the political and economic turmoil of the 8th–11th centuries. A few fragments of paintings, datable to the 8th century, were found in two cave shrines, Maravidiya and Pulligoda, at Dimbulagala. Copies of the Maravidiya wall paintings (destr.) provide evidence of a cycle of paintings depicting episodes from the Buddha’s life and stories of his previous births (jātakas). In the Pulligoda Cave a fragment of what must once have been a large wall painting depicts a group of deities seated on lotuses, their hands joined in adoration or holding flowers as offerings. The figures are defined and detailed in heavy, carefully drawn lines; their bodies, except for one blue-skinned figure, are painted an orange yellow, and shaded lightly to give a sense of volume; outlines are a reddish orange as are garments and ornaments; details have been picked out in white. A point of interest is the use of foreshortening in depicting the folded arms and legs.
Copies made early this century of a large c. 8th-century wall painting (destr. by fire) in the cave shrine at Hindagala show episodes from the life of the Buddha. Judging from these copies, the Hindagala wall painting shows significant advances technically and aesthetically, compared, for instance, to the Dimbulagala paintings. The linear technique, widely employed elsewhere in Sri Lanka, has yielded to a more naturalistic and painterly method in which tonal modelling and soft outlines have been used to suggest volume. The positioning of figures at different points in the picture plane shows an appreciation of spatial depth and adds a note of realism to the painting.
Wall paintings were often done in the relic chambers of stupas. A preliminary sketch for such a wall painting of the 8th century (Mihintale, Archaeol. Mus.) was discovered in the relic chamber of a stupa at Mihintale. It depicts a number of divinities, shown moving among clouds, venerating the Buddha. They have been identified as the guardians of the four directions and their attendants. The rough outlines, executed in vigorous brushstrokes, suggest the unlaboured style of a competent draughtsman. A finished painting of the 11th century (Anuradhapura, Archaeol. Mus.) was discovered in the relic chamber of the Mahiyangana Stupa. It depicts the Buddha seated under the bodhi tree, attended by deities, as well as arhats (perfected beings) and the two main Hindu gods, Shiva and Vishnu. Though painted in the traditional linear style, it lays much emphasis on colour, applied in light and dark tones to suggest volume. Bold lines add clarity to the composition and make the figures appear strong and lively.
A new period of artistic activity was ushered in when, after the Chola interregnum (922–1070), Vijayabahu I (reg 1055–1110) re-established the sovereignty of the Sinhalese and started a programme of reconstruction in the capital city of Polonnaruva. His successors continued the policy, and a number of religious and secular buildings were decorated with paintings. Among the pictorial remains from this period are the well-known wall paintings in the Gal Vihara shrine and the Tivanka image-house. In the Gal Vihara shrine two fragments depict divinities worshipping the Buddha. One of the figures is an excellent representation of the god Brahma shown as a venerable old man with balding head and flowing beard. The paintings in the Tivanka image-house are in three groups arranged in a hierarchical order of sanctity. The monumental paintings in the sanctum represent episodes from the life of the Buddha, while those in the antechamber show gods in joyous adoration of him. The paintings in the less sacred entrance vestibule depict jātaka stories.
Polonnaruva wall paintings on the whole follow the same basic technique as the paintings in the earlier cave shrines. There is, however, a greater sensitivity to the beauty of line-work and colour. In general the lines are firm, clear and executed with sureness, showing no signs of laboured redrawing. Colours are mainly the same reds and yellows as before, but with the addition of green for foliage. From what little is left of the colours, it would appear that tonal modelling was used to suggest volume. In delineating the human figure, proportions, movement and facial expressions have been rendered naturalistically, though within the limits of conventional idealism. The same combination of naturalism and idealism informs the complex compositions of groups of figures, background landscapes and architectural details, enhancing the narrative power of the murals.
Although the Tivanka image-house itself dates from the latter part of the 12th century, all the extant paintings there do not date from the same time, as is evident from the presence of more than one layer of painting and more than one style. The distinction in style between the paintings in the sanctum and the antechamber on the one hand, and those of the entrance vestibule on the other, supports the possibility that a later generation of artists either retouched the old paintings or painted over the damaged parts using a less exacting technique. In any event the paintings in the vestibule of the Tivanka image-house are an indication that the classical tradition, represented by the paintings in the sanctum and the Gal Vihara shrine, was already in decline.
Bibliography
- W. G. Archer: ‘Painting in Ceylon’ in S. Paranavitana: Ceylon: Paintings from Temple, Shrine and Rock (New York, 1957)
- N. Wijesekera: Early Sinhalese Painting (Maharagama, 1959)
- S. Gunasinghe: ‘Art and Architecture’, Modern Sri Lanka: A Society in Transition, eds: T. Fernando and R. N. Kearney (New York, 1979), pp. 227–63
- S. Bandaranayake: The Rock and Wall Paintings of Sri Lanka (Colombo, 1986)
(iii) 15th century–1815.
- Siri Gunasinghe
No wall paintings that can be securely dated have survived from the period following the abandonment of Polonnaruva in the 13th century. Contemporary literary records, however, leave no doubt that painting continued during this period, and when a cultural revival took place in the Kandyan kingdom under the patronage of King Kirti Sri Rajasimha (reg 1747–82), there were many painters with experience available to paint new murals and to repair old ones. Although the new paintings (usually called Kandyan after the capital) differ from older paintings in style, they deal with the same subject-matter, the story of the Buddha, told partly through the mythological jātakas (stories of his past lives) and partly through episodes from his historic life. A few jātakas, such as the Vessantara jātaka, are favourite stories that have become part of the folk tradition and are considered essential in any mural programme. Apart from emphasizing the spiritual authority of the Buddha, the stories carry moral teachings. Transmitting such teachings was a major function of the paintings.
Perhaps the most arresting episode from the life of the Buddha is the Assault of Mara, which usually occupies a prominent position on the ceiling, just above the principal image of the Buddha. It is always monumental in conception, colourful and dramatic, as it is, for instance, at Degaldoruva or Dambulla. Another favourite is the scene of the Temptation by the Daughters of Mara, of which one of the best representations is at Madavela. The Seven Weeks cycle, dealing with the events immediately following the enlightenment, is calculated to evoke admiration for the superhuman personality of the Buddha. Subjects other than the story of the Buddha include heavenly abodes and scenes of hell, meant to encourage ethical living. Also frequently depicted are the major pilgrim centres of the island, an indication of the importance of pilgrimage as part of religion (see also Buddhism, §III, 2). Although there are idealized portraits of kings and nobles as donors, there are few representations of secular events. Besides these themes, the Kandyan painter’s repertory also included a large variety of intricate decorative designs developed out of a host of geometric, floral and animal motifs, with which all available wall space is covered.
Likely derived from a folk tradition of narrative and decorative illustration, Kandyan painting lacks the monumental quality of the ancient styles. Stories are told without detail or embellishment, highlighting only dramatic moments and main events. All characters and objects are represented in highly stylized conventional forms. Human figures, animals, trees and other details are first defined in bold outlines, creating beautiful linear patterns on the uncluttered background. The outlines are then filled in with brilliant colours, mainly reds, yellows and white, applied flat, without any shading or tonal modelling; black, blue and green are used sparingly to pick out details. The entire background is painted a solid red so as to throw the figures into relief. The uncrowded background, representing an abstract space, adds to the mythological import of the story by removing it beyond mundane time and space. Stylized lotuses, placed in prominent positions in the background, emphasize the decorative effect while strengthening the mythicizing imagery.
The paintings of Degaldoruva, Madavela and Dambulla, executed during the early stages of the 18th-century religious revival, are among the best works in this style. Created under royal patronage by the most competent artists, these early paintings are remarkable for their bold line and brilliant colour, the two main sources of their aesthetic.
Manuscript production was also stimulated by the religious revival, but illustrated examples are rare). Painted wooden covers of jātaka manuscripts produced in the 19th century are in a flat style similar to that of the Kandyan wall paintings (e.g. London, BL, OMPB Stowe Or. 28). Textual illustrations, when found, are incised and inked on the palm-leaf folios.
Besides the mainstream Kandyan school of wall painting, there were others that developed distinct variations of the style, such as the southern school of the maritime provinces and that of Sabaragamuva, an intermediate region forming part of the Kandyan kingdom but with close economic ties to the maritime region. Some of the older paintings in the temples at Mulkirigala, Telvatta and Kelaniya can be viewed as early examples of the southern style. It is evident from these paintings that the different styles, though evolving independently of each other, shared broadly the same technical prescriptions and the same aesthetic considerations. The few differences in detail are to be expected as the southern paintings were executed in a cultural context that, after more than two centuries of European domination, was different from that of the Kandyan kingdom.
Political unrest and wars with the British, who had been in occupation of the maritime provinces since 1796, left the last two kings of Kandy and their chiefs little time or resources to sponsor artistic activity. By the end of the 18th century, wall painting had lost its vitality, with artists producing poor imitations of earlier works. It would appear that even that modest exercise ceased with the loss of sovereignty to the British in 1815.
Bibliography
- A. Coomaraswamy: Medieval Sinhalese Art (Broad Campden, 1908/R New York, 1956)
- S. Gunasinghe: An Album of Buddhist Paintings from Sri Lanka (Kandy Period) (Colombo, 1978)
- S. Bandaranayake: The Rock and Wall Paintings of Sri Lanka (Colombo, 1986)
(iv) Colonial period.
- Siri Gunasinghe
Important developments in painting resulted from the annexation in 1815 of the Kandyan kingdom to the British-ruled maritime provinces, making the entire country a British crown colony. The 300-year period during which the maritime provinces had been successively under the control of Portuguese, Dutch and British rulers had, through conversion to Christianity and European schooling, produced a virtually new cultural community comprising a large section of society. Contact with the Buddhist establishment in Kandy, the organizational centre of the religion, led to a Buddhist resurgence in the maritime provinces. A spurt of artistic activity followed: by the end of the 19th century many new temples were built and old ones renovated, all of them complete with wall paintings.
By the beginning of the 19th century, artists of the southern school had moved away from the old tradition by achieving a sense of realism that is altogether lacking in the Kandyan paintings. The tall and slender men and women of the southern paintings are delineated in graceful postures. They are dressed in colourful clothes that drape round their bodies in a realistic manner. Except for stylized gestures, their movements and actions appear natural. Animals, trees, buildings and contemporary furniture look like their prototypes. Elements of realism become more pronounced in the second half of the 19th century as shown, for example, by paintings in the Lower Temple at Mulkirigala, the Purvarama at Kataluva and the Subodharama at Karagampitiya. Some painted in the late 1890s at the Karagampitiya temple complex in suburban Colombo show no vestige of the earlier style. The bold outlines that performed a dominant decorative role in the older tradition have been completely submerged under pigments with pronounced light and shade effects. The palette has become richer by the addition of many greens, blues and browns. For the first time, there is also a tentative attempt to use linear perspective. These paintings show not only the technique to have changed but the traditional aesthetic principles to have been abandoned as well.
The stimulus for these changes must be sought in the European paintings that were in circulation in the urban areas during more than three centuries of colonial occupation. It is clear, however, that the southern artists had acquired no more than a superficial acquaintance with European art. Nevertheless, the influence of European painting on their thinking had become an accomplished fact by the end of the 19th century.
The late 19th century also marked the real beginning of modern painting, particularly in Colombo. In 1887 an exhibition of arts and crafts was sponsored by the newly formed Colombo Drawing Club, a group of amateur artists drawn from the mostly European élite of Colombo. In 1891 the club was replaced by the more formal Ceylon Society of Arts; its first exhibition in 1892 inaugurated the ‘modern’ era.
Bibliography
- S. Bandaranayake: The Rock and Wall Paintings of Sri Lanka (Colombo, 1986)
- S. Gunasinghe: An Album of Buddhist Paintings from Sri Lanka (Kandy Period) (Colombo, 1987)
(v) Modern period.
- Siri Gunasinghe
Painting in urban centres in the 20th century retained its traditional religious role but also became a secular art. Western techniques and modes of expression were accepted even by artists belonging to traditional hereditary craft groups, and a new élite class of artists emerged, who came to painting from a variety of backgrounds out of choice rather than as a hereditary occupation. The work of such artists has been varied, reflecting colonial and post-colonial international contacts as well as an interest in translating themes and styles of Sri Lanka’s ancient painting tradition into a modern idiom. Painting has been practised simultaneously on a variety of levels: as a ‘traditional’ art, a ‘popular’ urban art and ‘gallery’ art.
The changing role and status of artists in the 20th century is evident in the career of the enterprising and influential Maligawage Sarlis (1880–1955), who began as an apprentice to George Henricus and his brother Basil Henricus, painters of theatrical scenery for the Colombo stage. Sarlis went on to paint temple murals in a style of ‘theatrical realism’, using such techniques as perspective and trompe l’oeil. His geometrically balanced compositions are often formal and severe. Although his pictures are characterized by varied shades and colours, detailed costumes and complex architectural backgrounds, they lack the decorative quality and fluency of narration that were strengths of the traditional style. In the 1930s Sarlis had a series of paintings reproduced in large quantities in Germany as glossy, colourful and inexpensive oleographs. They consisted mainly of scenes from the life of the historical Buddha and jātaka stories, recounting the Buddha’s previous lives. Widely distributed, these exuberant prints are often credited with shaping popular taste.
Solias Mendis, known mainly for temple murals such as those in the Rajamahavihara, Kelaniya, in the 1930s and 1940s, introduced a new idiom (to some extent a reaction against Sarlis’s work), combining something of the spirit of the ancient murals with selected techniques of Western art. His dramatic compositions are complex but do not detract from the clarity of narration. They represent spatial depth successfully without the aid of perspective in the European manner, mainly by creating a number of superimposed planes within a composition. Mendis used only a limited range of colours, dominated by a yellowish orange, varying them according to mood and light. Despite its apparent realism, his art is consciously stylized in the manner of Ajanta (see Indian subcontinent: Painting from prehistory to the 16th century) and Sigiriya (see §V, 2 above).
As a result of their training in English art schools, many of the pioneers in modern painting in Sri Lanka adopted British academic realism in their work. They painted mainly secular subjects, usually romantic landscapes and portraits. Most excelled in draughtsmanship, which was considered the acid test of the good artist. Their compositions are formal and logical, if somewhat short on imagination. Their colours are usually sombre in tone and carefully controlled, the artists’ main concern being academic propriety. Among the best of this group are J. D. A. Perera and A. C. G. S. Amarasekera, recognized as excellent portraitists. Their work, however, failed to generate popular appeal.
The next generation, who began working in the 1930s and 1940s and some of whom were still active in the 1980s, reacted against what they regarded as unproductive academicism, searching instead for self-expression. Most sought to participate in contemporary international art movements. Rejecting such academic dictates as perspective, foreshortening, chiaroscuro and colour harmony, they opted instead for experimentation and the development of their own pictorial language. Painters of this generation include Stanley Abeysinghe, Geoffrey Beling, Justin Pieris Daraniyagala, Richard Gabriel, George Keyt, Manjusri Thero, David Paynter and Harry Pieris. Most belonged to the 43 Group, which had no particular artistic credo other than that an artist must create and not simply record surface reality. Some painters in this group realized the artistic potential of the ancient myths and legends of the Buddhists and the Hindus, which received little attention from most Westernized intellectuals. George Keyt, for example, drew on ancient Buddhist material. His murals in the Gotami Vihara, Borella, illustrating the life of the historical Buddha, are fine examples of the successful use of a modern idiom in dealing with an ancient theme. This combination of local sentiment and international idiom provided a stimulus for the next generation of painters, which includes Ranil Deraniyagala, Ranjit Fernando, Swanee Jayawardene, H. A. Karunaratne, Stanley Kirinde, Ivan Pieris, Senaka Senanayake and Gamini Warnasuriya. Extending the experiment begun in the 1940s, they developed a variety of individual styles.
Reservations about the adequacy of the new modes of expression and their foreign flavour moved some artists to put a greater emphasis on traditional aesthetics. Significant creative work has resulted from this search for roots in, for example, the paintings of Dayananda de Mel, Sumana Dissanayake and L. K. Karunaratne. Movements such as the Jatika Kala Peramuna (National Art Front) sought to develop a national idiom based on past forms of expression.
Bibliography
- J. M. Senaveratne: ‘Modern Sinhalese Art at the Kelaniya Temple’, Here is Kelaniya, ed. D. C. Wijewardene (Colombo, 1947)
- ‘Contemporary Artists’, Marg, 5/3 (1952), pp. 62–77
- L. P. Goonetilleke, ed.: The Doyen of Painters in Ceylon (Colombo, 1966)
- L. P. Goonetilleke, ed.: Viskam (Colombo, 1976)
- A. Halpe, ed.: George Keyt: A Felicitation Volume (Colombo, 1977)
- A. Halpe: ‘Painting and Sculpture’, Sri Lanka: A Survey, ed. K. M. de Silva (London and Honolulu, 1977)
- S. Bandaranayake: The Rock and Wall Paintings of Sri Lanka (Colombo, 1986)
- E. Dissanayake: ‘Ceylon’s 43 Group of Painters’, Arts of Asia, 16/2 (1986), pp. 61–7
VI. Other arts.
Whether the artefacts they produced were religious or secular, decorative or utilitarian, Sri Lanka’s artists and craftsmen through the centuries benefited from the island’s natural resources, including gems, metal ores and timber.
1. Arms and armour.
- Robert Elgood
In Sri Lanka, the transition from stone to iron weaponry occurred without the usual Chalcolithic interval. Partially carburized steel weapons were produced some 2000 years ago. The Sinhalese have throughout their history been noted for the production of good iron and steel. Analysis shows that this was unusually free from sulphur and phosphorus and rich in carbon. It was for many centuries exported, the Arab al-Kindi, writing at Basra, testifying to the excellence of the sword blades of ‘Serandib’ in the 9th century ad. The Vaijayānta, a Sanskrit text compiled in the 12th century, describes the manufacture of weapons prior to the arrival of Europeans, noting the eight metals to be employed, how weapons should be tempered, the auspicious and unlucky symbols found on blades, and the auspicious days for making or using a new weapon. The five important categories of weapons are the sword, bow, club, dagger and spear. In all, 96 varieties of weapon are listed. The manuscript provides rules on every aspect of production, for example the length and width of a royal sword and the decorative details of the hilt.
A number of varieties of axeheads are found, similar in form to those of tribal India. The simplest knives are of plain steel with wood or horn handles, and were formerly carried in the belt of every villager for domestic use. Extremely elaborate examples worn by chiefs in the Kandy period have gold and silver underlay and overlay and an intricately carved ivory grip. The blades were supplied by the blacksmiths, but the grip was usually the production of the paṭṭal-hatara (Skt: ‘four workshops’), a largely hereditary corporation of the highest craftsmen who worked exclusively for the king in Kandy. Originally there was only one workshop, but this was subsequently divided into sections that included the rankaḍu paṭṭala (‘golden sword workshop’, or armoury). Elaborate weapons were given as gifts by the king. Gifts of weapons were also made as votive offerings to temples.
Sri Lankan swords are invariably for single-handed use, no double-handed swords being known. The double-edged leaf pattern is common, as is a long straight blade, usually single-edged. The sword designed to indicate rank soon ceased to be suitable for fighting. The Rev. Cordiner wrote in 1807 that everyone in office wore a sword with a silver hilt and scabbard. Known as a kastāne, the sword originally had a lion’s-head pommel, a simple knuckle guard and plain quillons (the arms of the cross-guard of the handle). Elaborate fencing foils (boru kaḍuva) made of cane with massive ivory guards are also unique to Sri Lanka, as are superbly made matchlocks with curious bilobed stocks (see Pieris, 1936). The Sinhalese developed boomerangs and throwing clubs; some of the latter with distinctive knobs on the end of the grip also served as fencing clubs. Throwing axes, slings and blowpipes as well as bows were the principal projectile weapons. Armour was little used in the island but was not unknown. The armour of the last king with its breast and back plate and mail decorated with gold, emeralds and rubies was auctioned in London in 1820 (see Pieris, 1939). Silver shields also exist, though the usual material for shields was decorated hide. Some shields were covered with lead, which gripped the opponent’s sword.
Bibliography
- J. Cordiner: A Description of Ceylon, 2 vols (London, 1807)
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Mediaeval Sinhalese Art (Broad Campden, 1908/R New York, 1956)
- J. F. Pieris: ‘A King of Ceylon’s Gun’, Connoisseur (Sept 1936), pp. 153–5
- J. F. Pieris: ‘Beheth Karaka’, Observer Annual (1939), pp. 207, 219–20, 225
- P. E. P. Deraniyagala: ‘Sinhala Weapons and Armour’, Journal of the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, 35 (1942), pp. 96–134 [with extensive bibliog.]
2. Coins.
- R. C. C. Fynes
The major artistic influences on Sinhalese coinage have come from India and the Western colonial powers. Indian influence is seen first in the punch-marked silver coins apparently imported from India into Sri Lanka in the 1st century ad, but made in northern India in the 2nd and 3rd centuries bc. The first coins produced in Sri Lanka, probably also dating from the 1st century ad, are large copper coins, either round or rectangular. The round coins bear elephant, swastika, tree and hill symbols copied from Indian cast-copper coins. The rectangular coins, known as Lakshmi plaques, bear a full-length female figure standing between two trees on the obverse and on the reverse a tree symbol surmounted by a swastika.
In the 4th century bronze coins copying the designs of contemporary Roman coins, which had reached the island through trade, were made in Sri Lanka. Several hoards have been found at or near the sites of Buddhist monasteries. One of the commonest reverse types is a wheel-like symbol, possibly a representation of the Buddhist wheel of the law. In the 8th and 9th centuries Indian influence is again seen in copper coins bearing such symbols as a seated bull, lion and pair of fishes, designs that also appear on contemporary coins issued in southern India. Gold coins were issued for the first time in the 11th century. They bear the figure of a standing king on the obverse and a seated goddess on the reverse and were probably struck by the southern Indian Chola kings upon their invasion of Sri Lanka. Coins bearing these designs were also struck in copper and were the prototypes for a series of coins that continued to be produced for about 300 years.
During the early period of Portuguese domination (1505–1656), coins of Portugal and Portuguese India circulated on the island. The first coins minted by the Portuguese specifically for use in Sri Lanka were made in the reign of Philip II (reg 1598–1621) and bear such Portuguese designs as the globe, arms of Portugal and gridiron of St Lawrence, patron of the Portuguese fort at Colombo. After the expulsion of the Portuguese by the Dutch, which was complete by 1658, Portuguese, colonial Portuguese, Indian, Persian and Chinese coins were counterstamped for circulation on the island with a monogram of the letters VOC, the emblem of the Dutch East India Company. In 1660 the Dutch began striking copper coins, which also bore the VOC monogram. In the 18th century copper duits of the Netherlands provinces were used on the island. A local coinage of stivers and duits was issued in 1783, and in 1784 a silver rupee bearing crude legends in Arabic and Malay was minted.
In 1802 the British issued a coinage based on the Dutch denominations of stivers and rix dollars. They bore an elephant on the front and the value of the coin on the back. Coins bearing the head of George III on the obverse and an elephant on the reverse were issued in 1816. In 1821 a silver rix dollar of similar design was issued for George IV. From the 1820s Indian rupees formed the staple currency of the island, and in 1870 coins were issued with the head of Queen Victoria on the obverse and on the reverse a tree, which continued to be used as a reverse type until the reign of George VI. The crowned head of the British monarch appeared on Sinhalese coins until the reign of Elizabeth II.
In 1957 five and one rupee coins to celebrate 2500 years of Buddhism were issued. They bear representations of a stupa, the wheel of the law and animal motifs. Since independence, the national emblem of a lion within the wheel of the law has appeared on Sinhalese coins, most of which are produced at the British Royal Mint.
Bibliography
- H. W. Codrington: Ceylon Coins and Currency (Colombo, 1924)
- C. Bruce, J. S. Deyell, N. Rhodes and W. F. Spengler: The Standard Guide to South Asian Coins and Paper Money since 1556 AD (Iola, WI, 1981)
- R. Walburg: ‘Antike Münzen aus Sri Lanka/Ceylon. Die Bedeutung römischer Münzen und ihrer Nachahmungen für den Geldumlauf auf Ceylon’, Studien zu Fundmünzen der Antike, 3, ed. M. R. Alfoldi (Berlin, 1985), pp. 27–272
- C. Jayasinghe: Catalogue of the Pre-colonial Sinhalese Coins in the British Museum (in preparation)
3. Dress.
- Nimal de Silva
Sri Lanka’s tropical climate, hot and humid throughout the year, has been an important factor in dress design. Until the late 19th century, the dress of men and women consisted mainly of a lower garment, with the body and head ornamented with gold and silver jewellery and natural flowers to suit the occasion and the wearer’s status and occupation. The traditional dress of the élite is depicted in early sculpture and painting. The king wore a long lower garment with pleated frills on the front and sides. His jewellery consisted of 64 ornaments including earrings, necklaces, bangles, belts and rings as well as a crown. Kings of the later periods wore a full loose lower garment with a highly decorated long-sleeved jacket that reached below the waist.
The Sigiriya paintings of the 5th century ad provide the best early colour representation of women’s dress. The lower garment was a cloth worn below the navel and pulled tight at the hips with a pleated frill on one side. A similar style of dress is depicted in paintings of the 12th century. The woman’s lower garment, or kambaya, was usually a textile with a vertical pattern while horizontal lines were emphasized in the sarong worn by men. Some female figures at Sigiriya wear a tight blouse as an upper garment. Even today, the blouse with a cloth as the lower garment is the traditional dress of rural women. Silver and gold jewellery is a continuing tradition.
From the second half of the 19th century ladies of the Sinhalese élite in the maritime region adopted a long skirt and a long-sleeved jacket with an open neck, inspired by the dress of the ruling British colonials. The ladies of the Kandyan region wore the traditional oharivā, a long cloth wrapped around the waist with one corner of the starting end of the cloth falling from the waist to the feet in front. The fall was used to cover the breast by drawing it over the shoulder and wrapping the end around the waist. Modified with a long back-fall and a frill around the hip and worn with a blouse with short puffed sleeves, this was known as the Kandyan sari. For girls a special dress, the lama sāṛiya, came into use; it consisted of a cloth wrap gathered at the hip with a frill and worn with a sleeveless jacket with a pleated frill at the neck. Men wore a white sarong with a long, loose shirt with long sleeves and a round neck. This remains the national dress, but many men wear European-style clothing for everyday use. In the 20th century many women have adopted the 6 m-long Indian sāṛī worn with a short blouse.
Bibliography
- R. Knox: An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon in the East India (London, 1681/R New Delhi, 1984), pp. 89–93
- M. P. Goonadasa: Chandrā Mahum Silpaya (Colombo, 1967)
- H. I. Mallika: Sinhalese Female Costume: Local Development and Foreign Influences (diss., U. Moratuva, 1981)
4. Furniture.
- Ismeth Raheem
Medieval-period furniture is known mainly from relief sculptures and wall paintings. Rare surviving examples include seats, couches and thrones—geometric, austere and hewn out of solid blocks of granite—found at Sigiriya (7th–12th century) and Ritigala (8th–11th century). The use of such furniture in stone and wood was limited to the ruling classes and priests. The rural majority of the population had little need for furniture. Instead they used simple mats of natural fibres (cane, reed, coconut and palmyra fronds) for normal household activities, both social and religious. Wooden furniture, if used at all, would have been mainly boxes, cabinets or chests, well crafted and usually in exotic woods, carved, lacquered or with inlay work.
By the 16th century the Portuguese had widened the market for South Asia’s aromatic and exotic woods (well known from Classical antiquity) and for export furniture. With the development of the furniture trade, a distinct Indo-Portuguese style evolved. A distinguishing feature of this furniture was the extensive use of ebony. Initially, furniture for export consisted of boxes, chests, cabinets and small desks with ivory or bone inlay in simple floral designs. Sri Lankan products were particularly valued for their excellent ebony and ivory inlay work. Outstanding export goods of the mid-16th century included caskets composed of carved-ivory panels (e.g. London, BM and V&A; Munich, Residenz; see §VI, 5. below). As trade in export furniture developed, demand increased for furniture based on European designs, which in the hands of the Sri Lankan craftsmen became a combination of oriental ornamentation and European motifs. Chairs produced in Sri Lanka in the Indo-Portuguese style are invariably of ebony; the upright backs are usually arcaded; seat rails are carved in low relief; and stretchers are spirally turned or spindled. Another feature is the cane or rattan seat, probably of Sri Lankan origin and introduced by the Portuguese into Europe in the 16th century.
During the Dutch colonial period (1656–1796) furniture from Sri Lanka reached the Netherlands both as official exports and as private possessions of returning citizens. The bulk of it was manufactured by the artisans’ department (Ambachts Quartier), an integral part of the Dutch Administration that was within the Fort of Colombo. The Dutch preferred dark, coloured, and grained woods. Calamander (Diospyros quaesita), for example, a finely grained heavy timber endemic to Sri Lanka, was highly prized for its hazel-brown colour streaked with black. Other prized woods were satinwood, tamarind, nadun (Pericopsis moonia), jak (Artocarpus integrafolia) and teak, which was either stained or lacquered to resemble ebony. Dutch residents in Sri Lanka adapted some traditional domestic furniture. In common use was the knaap (Sinh. kanappuva), a stand mainly for supporting spittoons, used especially by women who acquired the habit of chewing betel leaves. Another unique piece of furniture was the ebony church-chair (kerkstoel) carried by the owner’s servant to liturgical services. However, the ‘burgomaster’ chair was typically Dutch; this type of chair is thought to have been modelled in the Netherlands c. 1735 and in Sri Lanka c. 1760.
By the first decades of the 19th century Sri Lanka had become one of the main furniture-manufacturing centres for Britain and its Asian territories because of the availability of a wide range of hard woods, its long tradition of fine-wood carving and ivory inlay-work, and an increasing demand in Britain and abroad for exotic woods (e.g. ebony, satinwood, calamander). Although the Anglo-Indian style of furniture imitated English designs, many items produced by Sri Lankan craftsmen had distinctive details and ornamentation. In the first few decades of British rule, for instance, the use of woven cane or rattan for chairs, sofas and beds gained popularity because of its functional advantage in a tropical climate. Some of the finest pieces were produced as personal furniture for highly placed officials of the British overseas administration during the first few decades of the 19th century. At this time State officials amassed considerable profits in private trade (prohibited in 1845) including the sale of export furniture to England. During the last decade of the 19th century the design of Anglo-Indian furniture tended to be heavy, ornate and florid. Simple indigenous decoration on light woods (teak, nadun and jak) was superseded by European designs characterized by the use of scallop-shells, fluting, balustrades, columns and flowery borders.
Bibliography
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Mediaeval Sinhalese Art (Broad Campden, 1908/R New York, 1956)
- J. Pearson: ‘European Chairs in Ceylon in the 17th and 18th Centuries’, Journal of the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, 31/81 (1928), pp. 77–101
- E. Reimers: ‘Colonial Dutch Furniture’, Journal of the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, 34 (1938), pp. 80–197
- R. L. Brohier: Furniture of the Dutch Period in Ceylon (Colombo, 1969, 2/1978)
- T. Falk: ‘Inlaid and Ebony Furniture from British India’, Orientations, 17/3 (1986), pp. 47–56
5. Ivory.
- Brendan Lynch
Although the art of the ivory-carver in Sri Lanka undoubtedly had its roots in ancient times, extraordinarily good ivory caskets were produced between the 16th and 18th centuries ad. The most splendid examples were made in the mid-16th century in the kingdom of Kotte for presentation as diplomatic gifts to the Portuguese. The ivory is elaborately carved and the caskets are further embellished with gold fittings mounted with precious stones (see fig.; see also §VII, 2 below).
Numerous cabinets survive from the Dutch colonial period (1656–1796) and include one with European figural as well as traditional Sri Lankan foliate motifs (Oxford, Ashmolean, 1976.6). Another, with hinged doors, is carved with the figures of Adam and Eve (London, V&A). A third, with a curving hinged lid, is carved with human masks (Copenhagen, Kstindustmus.; two further fine examples are in the Louvre, Paris). An unusually large ivory-overlaid cabinet (Oxford, Ashmolean, 1981.47) is carved with large flowers encircled by meandering stems reminiscent of Coromandel Coast textiles of the late 17th century to the early 18th.
During the Kandy period, the arts flourished under Kirti Sri Rajasimha (reg 1747–82). Numerous Buddha figures of outstanding quality were produced (e.g. London, BM, OA 1985.1–26.1). An unusual plaque is carved in relief with a Buddha flanked by courtly attendants (see St Aubyn, p. 211). Ivory continued to be used in the making of weapons and was incorporated into silver-mounted dagger-hilts (e.g. Clive Col., Powis Castle, Powys, NT) or carved with dragon-head finials (e.g. London, V&A). It was also popular for hair-combs carved with minute detail and the ubiquitous scrolling foliage, heightened with red or black paint (e.g. Powis Castle, Powys, NT; London, BM). Vast ritual spoons were mounted with carved ivory handles (e.g. London, V&A). Door-plaques of ivory depicting attendants to guard temple and deity were set into wood doors (e.g. Oxford, Ashmolean; see Coomaraswamy, pl. 35). Free-standing figures of chiefs, their wives and servants were also produced during this and the subsequent period, displaying great competence, character and detail of costume and jewellery (see Ivories of China and the East, no. 268; London, Sotheby’s, 9 April 1984, lot 388 and 24 April 1991, lot 653). Although traditional objects continued to be produced, there was a decline in both quality and quantity during the 19th century.
Bibliography
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Mediaeval Sinhalese Art (Broad Campden, 1908/R New York, 1956)
- J. van Lohuizen-de Leeuw: Sri Lanka: Ancient Arts (London, 1981)
- P. Pal: Elephants and Ivories (Los Angeles, 1981)
- Ivories of China and the East (sale cat. by R. Keverne, London, Spink & Son, 8–23 Nov 1984)
- F. St Aubyn, ed.: Ivory: A History and Collectors’ Guide (London, 1987)
- U. von Schroeder: Buddhist Sculptures of Sri Lanka (Hong Kong, 1990)
6. Jewellery.
- Nimal de Silva
Sri Lanka is famous for its gems and pearls, both important in jewellery design. In traditional jewellery, gems were cut and polished, but were not faceted as in modern European jewellery. Natural forms and colours were incorporated in the design.
Jewellery dating to c. 3rd to 5th century ad of such materials as gold, glass, beads and ivory was found in excavations at the Jetavana Stupa in Anuradhapura (Anuradhapura, Archaeol. Mus.). Other early examples include a gold ear ornament probably dating to the 5th century ad found at Sigiriya. The 5th-century paintings at Sigiriya depict bracelets, necklaces, earrings and hair ornaments. Such early Sri Lankan examples resemble contemporary Indian works, but there is also a distinct local character. In the Kandyan kingdom, especially during the 18th century, strong links with south India, particularly Kerala, are evident. Surviving examples of Kandyan work include the jewellery of the last king of Kandy, Sri Vikrama Rajasimha (reg 1798–1815), as well as his bejewelled throne (Colombo, N. Mus.).
European influence was present from the arrival of the Portuguese in the 16th century. During the period of Dutch rule (1656–1796) jewellery was produced on European models, but the detailing and manufacturing techniques were traditional. These beautiful Sinhalese-Dutch products, known as Low Country jewellery, include brooches, buttons, rings, earrings, combs and hairpins. The most extensive collections of Sri Lankan jewellery are in the National Museums in Colombo and Kandy.
Sri Lanka preserves for the most part the traditional system in which jewellery-making is confined to a single caste, the Navandanna, the skills of design and production being handed down from one generation to the next. Traditionally jewellery ornamented eight parts of the body: the head, ear, neck, arm, finger, waist, foot and toe. In addition to their ornamental effects, some types of jewellery are associated with protective, medicinal or healing powers. Different types of gems were associated with certain natural powers; for example the ring known as navaratna mūdūva is set with nine stones said to be those associated with the influences of the nine planets and with the power to repulse any negative effects resulting from the planetary positions in the horoscope. Also protective are the bodhi leaf pendant studded with a gem selected according to one’s horoscope and a pendant depicting the five protective weapons (pañcāudha) of the god Vishnu. A protective verse inscribed on gold or copper leaf or protective oils may be inserted in an amulet. Tiger’s claws or teeth are also set as amulets. The five auspicious metals (pañcaloha)—gold, silver, copper, tin and iron—are credited with both protective and healing powers when used in jewellery. Gold is considered the most auspicious metal and is said to prolong life; traditionally it was never worn on the feet as this was disrespectful to the metal.
Jewellery played and plays a particularly important role in the different stages of a woman’s life. The first occasion is the ear-piercing ceremony, in which small earrings are inserted. When a child is a year old he or she is fed rice for the first time; on this auspicious day the child is presented and dressed with different types of gold jewellery by the relatives. In traditional society a puberty ceremony was held in which jewellery had great significance. Most important of all is the wedding ceremony, where jewellery has the highest role both in the rituals performed and in the bride’s dress. Both bride and groom have wedding rings.
Much of the theory and practice of the jewellery craft is preserved in Sanskrit texts, the Silpa śastras. The Vaijayānta, a Silpa śastra text compiled in the 12th century, was popular both in Sri Lanka and south India; 14 palm-leaf (ola) copies of this text, mostly dating from the 17th–18th centuries, have been found in Sri Lanka, an indication of its widespread use (e.g. Colombo, N. Mus.). The text provides detailed descriptions of ornaments: 21 are to be worn from the toe to the hip, 21 from the hip to the top of the ear and 22 on the arms. The texts discuss the method of production and such features as the length, breadth and girth, the amount of gold and silver to be used, the technology of production, including different types of nails, pins, glue and threads to be used and methods of tying and binding.
In addition to some aspects of traditional jewellery craft, modern technology and materials are also now used in Sri Lanka. The tourist industry and export market offer craftsmen financial rewards for producing jewellery based on European and Japanese catalogues, though some elements of the ancient tradition survive.
Bibliography
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Mediaeval Sinhalese Art (Colombo, 1908/R New York, 1956), pp. 209–14
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: ‘Gold Embedding’, Spolia Zeylanica: Bulletin of the National Museums of Ceylon, 6/22 (1909), pp. 76–7
- F. A. Young: ‘Lapidary Reminiscences’, Blackwood’s Mag. (Feb 1942), pp. 144–9
- G. S. P. Dahanayake: ‘Navaratne Ring and its Significance’, Kalamanjari, 1/1 (1950), pp. 33–7
- J. A. W. Perera: ‘The Jewellery of Ceylon Royalty’, Kalamanjari, 1/1 (1950), pp. 5–11
- P. E. P. Daraniyagala: ‘An Antique Ring from Sabaragamuwa’, Ceylon Today, 3/7 (1954), pp. 18–19
- ‘Ceylon: Eine Werkstatt des Schmucks’, Diplomatischer Kurier, 8/5 (March 1959), pp. 166–8
- Y. Vallipuram: ‘Traditional Jewellery’, Times of Ceylon Annual (1964)
- L. Siedle: ‘Ceylon Gems and Jewellery’, Times of Ceylon Annual (1967), p. 6
- M. Nandasena, ed.: Vaijayānta Tantra (Kelaniya, 1983)
- E. Dissanayake: ‘Kandyan Male Jewellery from Fruits, Seeds and Flowers’, Serendib, 4/2 (1985), pp. 12–16
- E. Dissanayake: ‘Kandyan Jewellery: Traditional Jewellery of Sri Lanka’, Ornament, 9/4 (1986), pp. 35–44
- S. Gunawardena: The Part Played by Jewellery in the Life of the Women in Sri Lanka (diss., U. Moratuwa, 1987)
- I. Kahawita: ‘Navayūgayakāra gālāpena ape visitūra abharana’ [Our decorative jewellery for modern times], Silumina (27 March 1988), p. 18
7. Masks.
- Bob Simpson
In areas that are predominantly Sinhala Buddhist, masks (Sinh. ves mūnu) and masking constitute a rich and complex tradition in which masks are used by human actors to animate deities, demons and mythological characters. Dance, costume, mime and masking are blended to create a powerful theatrical vehicle for the expression of ideas and beliefs.
The origins of the Sinhalese tradition of masking are obscure, and archaeological and documentary evidence scant. Substantial evidence in the form of commentaries on ritual practices and the masks themselves coincide with colonial domination of the island from the 17th century onwards. During the 19th century many hundreds of Sinhalese masks found their way into the ethnographic collections of Europe, their bright colours and exaggerated features providing suitable typifications of the exotic. Similarly from the mid-20th century masks have been bought in large numbers by tourists.
The skills of the mask-carver were traditionally passed down by specialist teachers (gurunnānsē) who were members of castes traditionally associated with ritual performance. Accounts of the dimensions and characteristics of different masks were passed on in the form of prescriptive verses (ambuṇ kavi); however, much variation in the masks remained possible with individual carvers expressing considerable creativity. For the most part the masks are fashioned out of seasoned balsa and painted with pigments derived from vegetable and mineral sources.
Masks occur in two main ritual contexts: in the enactment of folk dramas and in rituals intended to propitiate deities and demons for purposes of exorcism, healing and ensuring the well-being of a village or community. The main forms of folk drama are kōlam and sokari. Kōlam is popular throughout the rural areas of southern Sri Lanka and gives rise to the greatest repertory of mask forms. It is believed to have originated as a result of the pregnancy craving of the chief queen of the mythical king Maha Sammata. The efforts of various people to satisfy her craving to see masked dancers resulted in kōlam, in which masks of human folk heroes, demons and animals are used in theatrical performance of well-known folk stories. Sokari is found in the central highlands of the island and is more limited in its expression. It concerns a single cycle of stories centred around a woman, Sokari, who runs away from her husband, and his efforts to find her. A major theme throughout this drama is one of overcoming infertility through supplications to the goddess Pattini. As in kōlam, the masks used in sokari portray much loved and, indeed, much lampooned characters from village life.
In rituals of exorcism and healing (tovil), masked actors take on a number of demonic forms. The elaborate iconography of demons has enabled exorcists to generate an extensive system of ritual masks. These range from the terrifying wolf-like visage of Maha Sohona, the Great Cemetery Demon, to the comical portrayal of illness in the form of the Eighteen Sanni Demons. Masks also feature to a lesser extent in village ceremonies known as Gammaduva and Devolmaduva in which local deities are invoked to ensure fertility and protection. Within these rituals dramatic interludes occur that have much in common with aspects of kōlam performances.
Bibliography
- E. R. Sarachchandra: The Folk Drama of Ceylon (Colombo, 1953)
- P. Wirz: Exorcism and the Art of Healing (Leiden, 1954)
- O. Pertold: ‘The Ceremonial Dances of the Sinhalese: An Inquiry into Sinhalese Folk Religion’, Ceylon Historical Journal, 20 (1973) [entire issue]
- M. H. Goonatilleka: Masks and Mask Systems of Sri Lanka (Colombo, 1978)
- R. Simpson: Ritual Tradition and Performance: The Beravā Caste of Southern Sri Lanka (diss., U. Durham, 1985)
8. Metalwork.
- Sirinimal Lakdusinghe
Knowledge about metals and metalworking is of great antiquity in Sri Lanka. Blacksmiths (Sinh. kabaras) are referred to in Brahmi inscriptions of the 3rd century bc to 4th century ad. Iron followed stone as a material for making tools and weapons. Iron technology may have been introduced to the island by the people of the Megalithic culture of the Indian subcontinent (see §II, 4 above). Steel implements were manufactured during the early historic period; iron and steel implements dated to the early historic period (3rd century bc–4th century ad) were unearthed at Tissamaharama in 1884 by Henry Parker, a pioneer in this field in Sri Lanka. Iron and steel implements have also been found at such early capitals of Sri Lanka as Anuradhapura, Sigiriya and Polonnaruva (Colombo, N. Mus.). Iron from Sri Lanka was used for making superior-quality weapons and was exported in considerable quantities to Muslim countries from about the 7th or 8th century ad. Evidence of numerous furnaces that made use of the annual south-west monsoon to generate extremely high temperatures has led archaeologists to estimate that 1000–3000 tons of iron (much of it destined for export) were produced annually in the two-month monsoon period. Iron and steel objects of the Kandyan period (15th–19th century ad) include agricultural implements, tools for carpenters and ivory-carvers, surgical instruments, guns, spears, arrowheads, elephant-goads, writing styles and varieties of domestic utensils (Colombo, N. Mus.; Kandy, N. Mus.). Some of these objects, such as the knives worn by Kandyan chiefs, were elaborately inlaid or overlaid with brass or silver. Sri Lankan blacksmiths use a traditional method of darkening the surface of ironwork to show up the inlay. This also serves as a preservative coating against rust.
Copper-smelting may have been practised in Sri Lanka even before the 6th century bc. A number of copper objects were unearthed in the protohistoric context (7th to 3rd century bc) at several archaeological sites. Excavations at Pin-wewa (Kurunegala District) yielded copper pins and bangles. At Pomparippu (Puttalam District) copper beads, bracelets, bangles, rods and pins were found. Similar objects were unearthed at Gurugal-hinna (Anuradhapura District). Coppersmiths (tabakaras) are referred to in epigraphic records. The Mahāvaṁsa (‘Great chronicle’) states that the Lohapasada, built by Dutthagamani Abhaya (reg c. 161–137 bc) at Anuradhapura, had a roof of copper tiles. Place-names current in the early historic period with the prefix tamba (‘copper’) included Tambapanni, Tambarattha, Tambapittigama and Tamba-kanda. From the beginning of the historical period copper was used to produce such objects as alms-bowls, pots and relic caskets and moulds for casting objects of all types. Some important copper objects have been excavated at the Abhayagiri Vihara, Anuradhapura. Copperplates were used in recording important events of kings’ reigns. A striking example is the royal grant of Vijayabahu I (reg 1055–1110) found at Morawaka (Matara District).
Bronze, an alloy of copper, was however preferred to copper, especially for casting icons (see also Bronze, §II, 4). A large number of bronze artefacts and images have been discovered from various ancient sites. Finds include images of the Buddha and Buddhist and Hindu deities, figures of animals, lamps, bells, bangles, pots, lime boxes, water-clocks and domestic utensils. A bronze seal was discovered in a burial at Anaikodai (Jaffna District). The numerous fine metal sculptures (see §IV above and fig. below) produced using the lost-wax process demonstrate the high level of proficiency in casting techniques attained while preserving aesthetic values.
Silver and gold objects are referred to in inscriptions and literary works from the early historical period. Silver is mentioned in the Mahāvaṁsa in connection with the building of the Ruvanveliseya at Anuradhapura in the 3rd century bc. Silver coins have been found at various sites. Silver was used as a component of an alloy with gold. In later periods silver was used for such objects as relic caskets, jewellery boxes, trays and scroll cases. In the modern period some silver souvenirs and ornaments are washed in a gold mixture to obtain a gilded effect.
A number of gold reliquaries shaped like miniature stupas were found at ancient Buddhist sites: Mihindusaya (200–100 bc), Dalivala (100 bc–ad 200), Lahugala (ad 100–200), the Ruvanveliseya (150–200) and the Dakkhina Stupa (100–200). These reliquaries were made with hammered sheets of gold. Buddha images made in this manner have been found at a number of sites; 21 such images attributed to the 12th century were discovered at the Kotavehera in Dedigama. Both silver and gold were used extensively in jewellery (see §VI, 6 above).
Bibliography
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Mediaeval Sinhalese Art (Broad Campden, 1908/R New York, 1956)
- R. Hadfield: ‘Sinhalese Iron and Steel of Ancient Origin’, History of the Public Works Department, 1796–1896, ed. P. M. Bingam, 2 (Colombo, 1918), pp. 87–104
- C. E. Godakumbura: ‘A Bronze Buddha Image from Ceylon’, Artibus Asiae, 26/3–4 (1963), pp. 230–36
- R. A. L. H. Gunawardana: ‘A Brass Plate Depicting Certain Episodes from the Last Days of the Kandyan Kingdom’, Oriental Art, n. s., 30/3 (1984), pp. 287–92
- S. Seneviratna: ‘The Archaeology of the Megalithic–Black and Red Ware Complex in Sri Lanka’, Ancient Ceylon, 5 (1984), pp. 237–307
- S. Seneviratna: ‘Iron Technology in Sri Lanka: A Preliminary Study of Resource Use and Production during the Early Iron Age’, Sri Lanka J. Human., 11/1–2 (1985), pp. 129–78
- S. B. Hettiaratchi: ‘Bronze and Other Metal Artifacts at Abhayagiriya Vihara’, Ancient Ceylon (1990)
- G. Juleff: ‘The Samanala-wewa Archaeological Survey’, Ancient Ceylon, 9 (1990), 1st edn, pp. 75–106
- G. Juleff: ‘Crucible Steel in Sri Lanka and India: New Evidence’, Ancient Ceylon, 12 (1990), 1st edn, pp. 33–59
- D. Keys: ‘Monsoon Winds Helped Forge the Swords of Islam’, Independent on Sunday (27 Oct 1991), p. 6
9. Terracotta.
- K. Hemantha Jayatilleke
Clay was widely used in Sri Lanka from prehistoric times; it is unknown when clay objects were first fired. The oldest surviving terracotta works of art were sun-dried, baked and finally fired in an open or covered kiln. The Mahāvaṁsa, Sri Lanka’s ancient Pali chronicle, refers to uḷu vaḍuvo (‘clay artists’) and also contains information about formulae and mixtures for special varieties of clay as well as pottery techniques that ensured strength and durability. The coil and slab methods were used to create hollow objects, including fairly large statuettes of gods or superhuman beings. Smaller figures were made solid to minimize cracks during firing. Moulds and the potter’s wheel were widely used only in later periods. Moulds, used mainly when objects of uniform features were desired, were employed after the 10th century ad for architectural decorations (e.g. at Polonnaruwa, Lankatilaka). The technique of pressing component parts separately and later affixing them to the body was also in use. The appliqué technique was employed for such details as jewellery or dress; other details were created with incised lines. The artist made features on figures by impressing the clay with fingers or fingernails. Application of colour to terracotta was rare in the early period, becoming common only in the late 17th century.
In subject-matter and style many terracottas exhibit a strong folk element. Terracotta objects pre-date the coming of Buddhism to Sri Lanka and terracotta works made after the arrival of Buddhism indicate that some earlier forms of worship continued. Small terracotta statuettes, some less than 100 mm high, probably intended as votive offerings have been found at widely distributed sites. Other works with religious associations include individual figurines, figures of couples, twin male statuettes and related phallic objects. Models of the male sex organ were made from an early date (before 3rd century bc), and at a later period (after 2nd century bc), were given human features while retaining the phallic shape. These figures were mounted on semi-cylindrical pedestals as a symbol of worship. Figurines depicting females were modelled with breasts or were made in the shape of a triangle. The female sex organs were not depicted, and such features as breasts were not exaggerated.
Terracotta architectural decorations (e.g. at Kandy, N. Mus.) are a classical derivation of the folk art tradition that continued until the late 17th century. Terracotta relief sculptures created as architectural embellishments portray Indian and indigenous mythological characters, for example dwarfs and such stylized animals as lions. The fine workmanship is indicative of a high degree of artistic skill. Such utilitarian objects as pots, ovens, lamps, moulds and crucibles were also made of terracotta. High or low-relief decorations, created mostly by the appliqué method, are seen on the outer surfaces of objects such as lamps and clay boxes (e.g. Amparai, Archaeol. Mus.; Anuradhapura, Archaeol. Mus.). Traditional artists continue to work in terracotta; with the support of government and private organizations, terracotta has become a growing cottage industry. At present, some well-known contemporary artists and traditional clay artists mainly focus on producing art work for tourists and for domestic ornamental purposes. Although reputed artists follow their own styles, the work of traditional artists displays a close resemblance to folk art tradition.
Bibliography
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Mediaeval Sinhalese Art (Broad Campden, 1908/R New York, 1956)
- H. Parker: Ancient Ceylon (London, 1909)
- P. E. P. Deraniyagala: ‘Ferro-lithic or Early Historic Terracotta Statuary and a Cist from Ceylon’, Spolia Zeylanica: Bulletin of the National Museums of Ceylon, 27/1 (1953), pp. 133–8
- P. E. P. Deraniyagala: ‘The Races of the Stone Age and of the Ferro-lithic of Ceylon’, Journal of the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, n. s., 5/1 (1957), pp. 1–23
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Indian Terracotta Art (1959)
- C. E. Godakumbura: Terracotta Heads, Art Series 10 (Colombo, 1965)
- H. Ellawala: Social History of Early Ceylon (Colombo, 1969)
- S. Deraniyagala: ‘Citadel of Anuradhapura 1969: Excavations in the Gedige Area’, Ancient Ceylon, 2 (1972), pp. 48–169
- K. H. Jayatilleke: Terracottas of Sri Lanka (MA thesis, U. Peradeniya, 1983)
- K. H. Jayatilleke: ‘Terracottas Found in the Alahana Parivena Excavations (1981–83)’, Q. Cult. Triangle, UNESCO - Sri Lanka Proj., 2/1 (March, 1984), pp. 25–9
10. Textiles.
- Nimal de Silva
Early sources for textiles include the chronicles recording the history of Sri Lankan civilization over some 2000 years, the Mahāvaṁsa, Culavaṁsa and Thūpavaṁsa, which provide accounts of cotton cultivation as well as spinning, weaving and dyeing. Among early works of art depicting textiles are the 5th-century ad paintings at Sigiriya showing female figures wearing striped garments of finely woven cloth. The textile material excavated at the Jetavana Monastery in Anuradhapura and material pasted on the feet of the main Buddha statue at Cave 1, Dambulla, are the oldest extant examples (3rd–5th century ad). The best collections of Sri Lankan textiles are in the National Museums in Colombo and Kandy and in private museums in Buddhist temples in Kandy, Kurunegala and Matara districts. Holdings include ornamented flags, decorated cloths and special cloths used to wrap palm-leaf (ola) books, most later than the 17th century.
Most indigenous weavers, scattered throughout the country, belonged to an occupational caste. The last link with this traditional system are the weavers in Kandy District who continue to practise their hereditary craft. The skills of fine weaving seem to have been imported from India from time to time, but in each case the industry decayed and skilled craftsmen were again sought from India. Two types of loom were used by traditional weavers, the pit loom and the standard loom. The loom was set up in an open shed, on a platform continuous with the outer verandah of the weaver’s house. Cotton was the staple raw material. Weavers produced plain cloth, later dyed and decorated, and also wove striped designs. Striped textiles are seen not only in the Sigiriya paintings, but also in paintings at Kotiyagala (5th century), Pulligoda (9th century), and at the Tivanka image-house (12th century).
Decorative techniques include drawing or painting by hand on textiles, block-printing, resist-dyeing with wax, embroidery and appliqué. Motifs, which include geometric and floral patterns as well as stylized animals, have many similarities with Indian designs. Designs were specifically selected according to the purpose of the textile. Dyes were made mainly from natural pigments extracted from plants available in different parts of the country. Red and black were the two main colours used. The long fleshy taproot of the chaya plant (Oldenlandia umbellata), which grows along the northern coast, provided the red dye. Black was obtained by processing iron rust with alum or with the help of gall or the bulu (Terminalia chebula) nut. Indigo (Indigo anil and Indigo tinctoria) was used to obtain a rich blue dye by pulping, churning and fermentation of the plants. The blue dye extracted was boiled with the cotton fabric, which was then dried in the shade. A bright yellow dye, used for the robes of Buddhist monks, was produced by boiling the hardwood jak (Artocorpus integra); other vegetable dyes were added to create a brown hue.
The Sinhalese had a great affinity to white cloth as it symbolizes purity and cleanliness, especially at religious ceremonies. At a marriage ceremony the groom presents a long length of white cloth to the bride’s mother. The mother accepts the cloth and carries it on her head to show its importance. In dancing ceremonies the white cloth is stitched with a black and red border and a red cloth cummerbund is worn. Chieftains decorate their white clothing with gold or silver embroidery.
Traditional flags form a special area of Sri Lankan textile design. There are seven basic types of flags: religious, provincial, departments in the king’s court, institutional, flags of honour, caste flags and decorative flags. The flags are of interest for their cultural, historical, anthropological and artistic significance. Most are painted with traditional symbols and decorative patterns using black and red on a white ground. The example illustrated is a flag of honour presented to Kappina Mudali, a general of the local army of the Dutch (17th century). The central feature is the general’s emblem, Narasimha, represented as a lion with a human face carrying a sword in one hand and a war drum in the other. Red and indigo blue are the main colours used on hand-made white cotton cloth.
State patronage has revived the handloom industry in modern Sri Lanka and the production of handloom textiles is widespread in rural areas. Commonly produced items include sāṛīs, sarongs, towels, bedsheets, curtains and other furnishing fabrics. Yarn is generally imported; traditional natural dyeing is no longer common, though vegetable dyes remain in use for the robes of Buddhist monks.
Bibliography
- ‘Weaving in Ceylon’, Penny Magazine of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, 2/88 (1833), pp. 325–6
- E. M. Coomaraswamy: ‘Old Sinhalese Embroidery’, Ceylon National Review, 1/2 (1906), pp. 119–29
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Mediaeval Sinhalese Art (Colombo, 1908/R New York, 1956) [weaving pp. 232–6; embroidery pp. 237–42]
- P. E. P. Daraniyagala: ‘The Two Deve Angam Cloths of Hanguranketa Maha Devale’, Journal of the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, 34 (1937), pp. 88–102
- J. A. W. Perera: ‘Preparation of Indigo Dyes and Cloth Dyeing as Cottage Industries’, Ceylon Trade Journal, 5/6 (1940), pp. 239–40
- ‘The Handloom Textile Industry’, Ceylon Trade Journal, 7/4 (1942), pp. 59–60
- ‘Ancient Cloths of Ceylon’, Ceylon Today, 2/7 (1953), pp. 25–6
- E. Lodowyk-Gyomroi: ‘On the Loom of Time’, Times of Ceylon Annual (1955)
- T. Ratnasara: ‘Ancient Textiles of Ceylon’, Ceylon Today, 4/7–8 (1955), pp. 16–22
- S. Jayawardhana: ‘Batik’, Times of Ceylon Annual (1966)
- T. de Rosario: Embroidery (Colombo, 1972)
- S. Kusumsiri: Batik Kalawa (Colombo, 1972)
- E. Premadasa: Ornamental Stitchcraft (Colombo, 1973)
- J. Visick: ‘Back to Wax: Sri Lanka Batik Printing’, Design (London), 206 (1974), pp. 68–71
- M. Andrews: ‘Sri Lanka’s Batik Master’, Orientations, 9/10 (1978), pp. 58–62, 64–5
- T. Vimalananda: ‘The Popular Art of Batik’, Sri Lanka Today, 25/2 (1978), pp. 41–4
- V. Dharmawardhana: ‘Batik Art in Sri Lanka’, Asian Culture, 24 (1979), pp. 16–17
- B. C. de Silva: ‘Handloom Industry in Sri Lanka’, Business Lanka, 3/2 (1984), pp. 5–6
- A. Dharmasiri: ‘Pethikada, Sri Lankan Cloth Paintings’, Serendib, 5/1 (1986), pp. 13–15
11. Wood-carving.
- L. K. Karunaratne
Particularly in the wooden building tradition of Kandy (c. 1480–1815), wood-carving was an important form of architectural decoration. Wooden pillars, an important structural element, generally have a square base and an octagonal shaft interspersed with square panels carved with such traditional designs as lotuses, swans or figures of dancers. Brackets are carved with drooping lotus blossoms. Beams are also carved, the beam-end often finished with a scroll motif (Sinh. sulipathkaḍa). Rafters are carved on the underside creating a decorative ceiling. Figurative carvings include the ballad singer with his drum, village wrestlers in combat, stick dancers and soldiers on horseback. Bulls and lions appear frequently; panels with two swans or two eagles with decorative plumage are among the most skilfully rendered. The wood generally used is the golden-brown hardwood gammalu (Pterocarpus marsupium Roxb) commonly found in the hill country and used for carving doors, window-frames, rafters, furniture, beams and posts.
Much of the woodwork that has been preserved is in three types of buildings: assembly halls, shrine-rooms and travellers’ rest halls. Assembly halls may be within a palace complex, for example the royal audience hall in the palace at Kandy which has outstanding carved pillars; or in a temple, for example the elaborate drumming hall of the temple at Embekke near Kandy, where almost the entire range of traditional motifs is preserved on richly carved pillars and beams. A magnificent example of the shrine-room is the main shrine-room of the Temple of the Tooth Relic in Kandy, built in two storeys. All woodwork in this temple is both carved and painted. The doorway of wood is carved and inlaid with carved ivory panels. All the woodwork of the simple wooden rest hall at Panavitiya is carved—including rafters and beams. The medial square panels of pillars are carved with birds, animals and village scenes including a dancer, a drummer and a guest being received in a home. Wood-carvers used their skill to make the building a welcoming and interesting place for weary travellers to rest. Such rest halls are found along ancient roadways and footpaths and on the outskirts of villages and near temples. Travellers who have rested in these buildings have described the carvings in verse.
Bibliography
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Medieval Sinhalese Art (Broad Campden, 1908/R New York, 1956)
- A. M. Hocart: The Temple of the Tooth in Kandy, Mem. Archaeol. Surv. Ceylon, 4 (London, 1931)
- A. Boyd: ‘A People’s Tradition: An Account of the Small Peasant Tradition in Ceylon’, Marg, 1/2 (1947), pp. 25–40
- C. E. Godacumbure: Embekke Devale Carvings, Art Series 1 (Colombo, 1963)
- C. E. Godacumbure: Panavitiya Ambalama Carvings, Art Series 2 (Colombo, 1963)
- C. E. Godacumbure: Medawala Vihara Frescoes, Art Series 3 (Colombo, 1964)
- C. E. Godacumbure: Architecture of Sri Lanka (Colombo, 1976)
- L. K. Karunaratne: ‘The Wooden Architecture of Sri Lanka’, Ceylon Historical Journal, 25/1–4 (1978), pp. 174–85
- L. K. Karunaratne: Traditional Art of Wood Carving (Colombo, 1984)
VII. Museums.
Although much religious art—wall paintings and statuary—remains in situ in Buddhist temples and shrines, public collections are accessible in museums both in Sri Lanka and elsewhere.
1. Museums in Sri Lanka.
- W. Thelma T. P. Gunawardane
The Mahāvaṁsa (‘Great chronicle’) records that three buildings in Anuradhapura were used to display to the people the mast and hull of the boat in which the daughter of the Indian emperor Ashoka brought a branch of the sacred bodhi tree to Sri Lanka in the 3rd century bc. This is perhaps the oldest known record of the museum concept in the world.
Sri Lanka now has a variety of museums. The Department of National Museums maintains the National Museums in Colombo, Kandy and Ratnapura, as well as the Natural History Museum and the Dutch Period Museum in Colombo and the Folk Museum in Anuradhapura. In addition to these, the Archaeological Department maintains site museums, and there are a number of such smaller museums as the Flag Museum.
The National Museum in Colombo (see also §III, 4 above) is housed in a magnificent building constructed for this purpose in 1877, designed by the British architect, James G. Smithers (1833–1910). Among the highlights of this museum, which gives a fascinating insight into Sri Lanka’s cultural heritage of over 2500 years, are the limestone statue of Buddha of the 5th century ad that graces the entrance, a 5th-century golden earring from Sigiriya (see fig. above), and the golden crown, throne, footstool, sword and scabbard of the last king of Kandy, Sri Vikrama Rajasimha (reg 1798–1815), which are on display in the Regalia Room. Another noteworthy exhibit is the golden bodhisattva from Veheragala, of the 8th century. The collection of Hindu bronzes is second only to that of the Government Museum and National Art Gallery, Madras. The National Museum also exhibits replicas of the frescoes from Sigiriya, as well as Sinhalese banners, ritual masks and furniture produced during the Dutch colonial period. The museum library includes in its collection several thousand inscribed palm-leaf (ola) manuscripts.
Bibliography
- A. K. Coomaraswamy: Bronzes from Ceylon, Mem. Colombo Mus., Series A, 1 (1914)
- W. A. de Silva: Catalogue of Palm Leaf Manuscripts in the Library of Colombo Museum, Mem. Colombo Mus., Series A, no. 4 (1938)
2. Collections of art outside Sri Lanka.
- Howard A. Wilson
Many of the finest collections of Sri Lankan art abroad have their origins in the island’s colonial periods: Portuguese (1505–1656), Dutch (1656–1796) and British (1796–1948). The main Portuguese collection is that of the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga in Lisbon; outstanding Dutch collections include those of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, the Rijksmuseum voor Volkenkunde in Leiden and the Gemeentelijke Museum voor Schone Kunsten in The Hague. The most important collection in the Western world is that of the British Museum in London; the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, also has outstanding holdings. Significant collections have been established in other European countries and in the USA, where the largest collection is that of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
Among the earliest objects in such collections are bronze religious images, mainly Buddhas and bodhisattvas (e.g. Avalokiteshvara, Chunda, Tara, Jambhala), held, for example, in the British Museum, the Bostom Museum of Fine Arts and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. A fine 6th-century standing Buddha is in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. Monumental bronzes include an exquisitely crafted standing Tara (dated by some scholars to the 7th–8th centuries and by others to the 12th) in the British Museum and two outstanding 14th-century pieces, a seated Buddha in the Royal Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh, and a Hanuman with gracefully elongated proportions in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
Beautifully carved ivory caskets, influenced both by maritime chests of Arab traders and by colonial tastes, are among the most spectacular and widely collected Sri Lankan art objects. The most historically important casket served as the repository for the treaty request of King Bhuvanekabahu VII (reg 1521–50) to John III (reg 1521–57) of Portugal, dated 1542, to ensure the succession of his grandson, Dharmapala, to the throne. It is now in the Schatzkammer der Residenz, Munich, along with other examples. Museums in the UK with important collections of ivory caskets include the Victoria and Albert (see fig. above) and the British Museum in London and the Ashmolean in Oxford. Dutch collections include those of the Rijksmuseum and the Gemeentelijke Museum voor Schone Kunsten. Other fine examples are in the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, Lisbon; the Museum für Indische Kunst, Berlin; and the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.
Sri Lankan ivory (see also §VI, 5 above) is especially valued because of its density and delicacy of colour. Small ivories, once treasured personal possessions, include Buddha figures in the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco and Buddha figures and a Shiva Nataraja in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Comb panels, given to brides, are represented in the collections of the British Museum, the Victoria and Albert, the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco, and the Cleveland Museum of Art. Examples of fan handles, gifts to Buddhist monks, are in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, the Staatliches Museum für Völkerkunde in Munich and the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago. The British Museum holds interesting human figures and water ladles, in which the ivory is magnificently crafted with silver; the latter are represented in the Victoria and Albert Museum collection as well. Ivory book covers for palm-leaf manuscripts are held by the Cleveland Museum of Art and the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago.
Painted objects are few. Among those in the Los Angeles County Museum is a scene of the Buddha’s parinirvāṇa. Handsome paddle-shaped Kandyan ‘king boards’, painted with royal ‘portraits’ and apparently carried in processions, are held by the Museum of Mankind, London; cloth paintings by the Cleveland Museum and the British Museum, which also holds painted book covers. Aspects of folk culture are represented by collections of masks in the University of British Columbia’s Archaeology Museum in Vancouver, the Field Museum in Chicago, the Victoria and Albert in London and the National Museum of Natural History in Washington, DC, which also holds an interesting collection of puppets.
Bibliography
- P. H. D. H. de Silva: A Catalogue of Antiquities and Other Cultural Objects from Sri Lanka (Ceylon) Abroad (Colombo, 1975)
- V. Dehejia: ‘South and Southeast Asian Art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art: 2. The Sri Lankan Collection’, Arts of Asia, 15/6 (1985), pp. 80–89