CHAPTER I.

SOURCES OF SINGHALESE HISTORY.--THE MAHAWANSO AND OTHER NATIVE ANNALS.

It was long affirmed by Europeans that the Singhalese annals, like those of the Hindus, were devoid of interest or value as historical material; that, as religious disquisitions, they were the ravings of fanaticism, and that myths and romances had been reduced to the semblance of national chronicles. Such was the opinion of the Portuguese writers DE BARROS and DE COUTO; and VALENTYN, who, about the year 1725, published his great work on the Dutch possessions in India, states his conviction that no reliance can be placed on such of the Singhalese books as profess to record the ancient condition of the country. These he held to be even of less authority than the traditions of the same events which had descended from father to son. On the information of learned Singhalese, drawn apparently from the _Rajavali_, he inserted an account of the native sovereigns, from the earliest times to the arrival of the Portuguese; but, wearied by the monotonous inanity of the story, he omitted every reign between the fifth and fifteenth centuries of the Christian era.[1]

[Footnote 1: VALENTYN, _Oud en Nieuw Oost-Indien, &c., Landbeschryving van t' Eyland Ceylon_, ch iv. p. 60.]

A writer, who, under the signature of PHILALETHES, published, in 1816, _A History of Ceylon from the earliest period_, adopted the dictum of Valentyn, and contented himself with still further condensing the "account," which the latter had given "of the ancient Emperors and Kings" of the island. Dr. DAVY compiled that portion of his excellent narrative which has reference to the early history of Kandy, chiefly from the recitals of the most intelligent natives, borrowed, as in the case of the informants of Valentyn, from the perusal of the popular legends; and he and every other author unacquainted with the native language, who wrote on Ceylon previous to 1833, assumed without inquiry the nonexistence of historic data.[1]

[Footnote 1: DAVY's _Ceylon_, ch. x. p. 293. See also PERCIVAL'S _Ceylon_, p. 4.]

It was not till about the year 1826 that the discovery was made and communicated to Europe, that whilst the history of India was only to be conjectured from myths and elaborated from the dates on copper grants, or fading inscriptions on rocks and columns[1], Ceylon was in possession of continuous written chronicles, rich in authentic facts, and not only presenting a connected history of the island itself, but also yielding valuable materials for elucidating that of India. At the moment when Prinsep was deciphering the mysterious Buddhist inscriptions, which are scattered over Hindustan and Western India, and when Csoma de Körös was unrolling the Buddhist records of Thibet, and Hodgson those of Nepaul, a fellow labourer of kindred genius was successfully exploring the Pali manuscripts of Ceylon, and developing results not less remarkable nor less conducive to the illustration of the early history of Southern Asia. Mr. Turnour, a civil officer of the Ceylon service[2], was then administering the government of the district of Saffragam, and being resident at Ratnapoora near the foot of Adam's Peak, he was enabled to pursue his studies under the guidance of Gallé, a learned priest, through whose instrumentality he obtained from the Wihara, at Mulgiri-galla, near Tangalle (a temple founded about 130 years before the Christian era), some rare and important manuscripts, the perusal of which gave an impulse and direction to the investigations which occupied the rest of his life.

[Footnote 1: REINAUD, _Mémoire sur l' Inde_, p. 3.]

[Footnote 2: GEORGE TURNOUR was the eldest son of the Hon. George Turnour, son of the first Earl of Winterton; his mother being Emilie, niece to the Cardinal Due de Beausset. He was born in Ceylon in 1799 and having been educated in England under the guardianship of the Right Hon. Sir Thomas Maitland, then governor of the island, he entered the Civil Service in 1818, in which he rose to the highest rank. He was distinguished equally by his abilities and his modest display of them. Interpreting in its largest sense the duty enjoined on him, as a public officer, of acquiring a knowledge of the native languages, he extended his studies, from the vernacular and written Singhalese to Pali, the great root and original of both, known only to the Buddhist priesthood, and imperfectly and even rarely amongst them. No dictionaries then existed to assist in defining the meaning of Pali terms which no teacher could be found capable of rendering into English, so that Mr. Turnour was entirely dependent on his knowledge of Singhalese as a medium for translating them. To an ordinary mind such obstructions would have proved insurmountable, aggravated as they were by discouragements arising from the assumed barrenness of the field, and the absence of all sympathy with his pursuits, on the part of those around him, who reserved their applause and encouragement till success had rendered him indifferent to either. To this apathy of the government officers, Major Forbes, who was then the resident at Matelle, formed an honourable exception; and his narrative of _Eleven Years in Ceylon_ shows with what ardour and success he shared the tastes and cultivated the studies to which he had been directed by the genius and example of Turnour. So zealous and unobtrusive were the pursuits of the latter, that even his immediate connexions and relatives were unaware of the value and extent of his acquirements till apprised of their importance and profundity by the acclamation with which his discoveries and translations from the Pali were received by the savans of Europe. Major Forbes, in a private letter, which I have been permitted to see, speaking of the difficulty of doing justice to the literary character of Turnour, and the ability, energy, and perseverance which he exhibited in his historical investigations, says, "his _Epitome of the History of Ceylon_ was from the first _correct;_ I saw it seven years before it was published, and it scarcely required an alteration afterwards." Whilst engaged in his translation of the _Mahawanso_, TURNOUR, amongst other able papers on _Buddist History_ and _Indian Chronology_ in the _Journal of the Bengal Asiatic Society_, v. 521, vi. 299, 790, 1049, contributed a series of essays _on the Pali-Buddhistical Annals_, which were published in 1836, 1837, 1838.--_Journ. Asiatic Soc. Bengal_, vi. 501, 714, vii. 686, 789, 919. At various times he published in the same journal an account of the _Tooth Relic of Ceylon, Ib._ vi. 856, and notes on the inscriptions on the columns of Delhi, Allahabad, and Betiah, &c. &c.; and frequent notices of Ceylon coins and inscriptions. He had likewise planned another undertaking of signal importance, the translation into English of a Pali version of the Buddhist scriptures, an ancient copy of which he had discovered, unencumbered by the ignorant commentaries of later writers, and the fables with which they have defaced the plain and simple doctrines of the early faith. He announced his intention in the _Introduction to the Mahawanso_ to expedite the publication, as "the least tardy means of effecting a comparison of the Pali with the Sanskrit version" (p. cx.). His correspondence with Prinsep, which I have been permitted by his family to inspect, abounds with the evidence of inchoate inquiries in which their congenial spirits had a common interest, but which were abruptly ended by the premature decease of both. Turnour, with shattered health, returned to Europe in 1842, and died at Naples on the 10th of April in the following year, The first volume of his translation of the _Mahawanso_, which contains thirty-eight chapters out of the hundred which form the original work, was published at Colombo in 1837; and apprehensive that scepticism might assail the authenticity of a discovery so important, he accompanied his English version with a reprint of the original Pali in Roman characters with diacritical points.

He did not live to conclude the task he had so nobly begun; he died while engaged on the second volume of his translation, and only a few chapters, executed with his characteristic accuracy, remain in manuscript in the possession of his surviving relatives. It diminishes, though in a slight degree, our regret for the interruption of his literary labours to know that the section of the _Mahawanso_ which he left unfinished is inferior both in authority and value to the earlier portion of the work, and that being composed at a period when literature was at its lowest ebb in Ceylon, it differs little if at all from other chronicles written during the decline of the native dynasty.]

It is necessary to premise, that the most renowned of the Singhalese books is the _Mahawanso_, a metrical chronicle, containing a dynastic history of the island for twenty-three centuries from B.C. 543 to A.D. 1758. But being written in Pali verse its existence in modern times was only known to the priests, and owing to the obscurity of its diction it had ceased to be studied by even the learned amongst them.

To relieve the obscurity of their writings, and supply the omissions, occasioned by the fetters of rhythm and the necessity of permutations and elisions, required to accommodate their phraseology to the obligations of verse; the Pali authors of antiquity were accustomed to accompany their metrical compositions with a _tika_ or running commentary, which contained a literal version of the mystical text, and supplied illustrations of its more abstruse passages. Such a _tika_ on the _Mahawanso_ was generally known to have been written; but so utter was the neglect into which both it and the original text had been permitted to fall, that Turnour till 1826 had never met with an individual who had critically read the one, or more than casually heard of the existence of the other.[1] At length, amongst the books which, were procured for him by the high, priest of Saffragam, was one which proved to be this neglected commentary on the mystic and otherwise unintelligible _Mahawanso_; and by the assistance of this precious document he undertook, with confidence, a translation into English of the long lost chronicle, and thus vindicated the claim of Ceylon to the possession of an authentic and unrivalled record of its national history.

[Footnote 1: TURNOUR's _Mahawanso_, introduction, vol. i. p. ii.]

The title "Mahawanso," which means literally the "_Genealogy of the Great_," properly belongs only to the first section of the work, extending from B.C. 543 to A.D. 301,[1] and containing the history of the early kings, from Wijayo to Maha Sen, with whom the Singhalese consider the "Great Dynasty" to end. The author of this portion was Mahanamo, uncle of the king Dhatu Sena, in whose reign it was compiled, between the years A.D. 459 and 477, from annals in the vernacular language then existing at Anarajapoora.[2]

[Footnote 1: Although the _Mahawanso_ must be regarded as containing the earliest _historical_ notices of Ceylon, the island, under its Sanskrit name of Lanka, occupies a prominent place in the mythical poems of the Hindus, and its conquest by Rama is the theme of the _Ramayana_, one of the oldest epics in existence. In the _Raja-Tarangini_ also, an historical chronicle which may be regarded as the _Mahawanso_ of Kashmir, very early accounts of Ceylon are contained, and the historian records that the King Megavahana, who, according to the chronology of Troyer, reigned A.D. 24, made an expedition to Ceylon for the purpose of extending Buddhism, and visited Adam's Peak, where he had an interview with the native sovereign.--_Raja-Tarangini_, Book iii. sl. 71-79. _Ib._ vol. ii. p. 364.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. i. The Arabian travellers in Ceylon mention the official historiographers employed by order of the kings. See Vol. I Pt. III. ch. viii. p. 387, note.]

The sovereigns who succeeded Maha Sen are distinguished as the "Sulu-wanse," the "lower race," and the story of their line occupies the continuation of this extraordinary chronicle, the second portion of which was written by order of the illustrious king Prakrama Bahu, about the year A.D. 1266, and the narrative was carried on, under subsequent sovereigns, down to the year A.D. 1758, the latest chapters having been compiled by command of the King of Kandy, Kirti-Sri, partly from Singhalese works brought back to the island from Siam (whither they had been carried at former periods by priests dispatched upon missions), and partly from native histories, which had escaped the general destruction of such records in the reign of Raja Singha I., an apostate from Buddhism, who, about the year A.D. 1590, during the period when the Portuguese were in occupation of the low country, exterminated the priests of Buddha, and transferred the care of the shrine on Adam's Peak to Hindu Fakirs.

But the _Mahawanso_, although the most authentic, and probably the most ancient, is by no means the only existing Singhalese chronicle. Between the 14th and 18th centuries several historians recorded passing events; and as these corroborate and supplement the narrative of the greater work, they present an uninterrupted Historical Record of the highest authenticity, comprising the events of nearly twenty-four centuries.[1]

[Footnote 1: In 1833 Upham published, under the title of _The Sacred and Historical Books of Ceylon_, translations of what professed to be authentic copies of the _Mahawanso_, the _Rajaratnacari_, and _Rajavali_; prepared for the use of Sir Alexander Johnston when Chief-Justice of the island. But Turnour, in the introduction to his masterly translation of the _Mahawanso_; has shown that Sir Alexander had been imposed upon, and that the alleged transcripts supplied to him are imperfect as regards the original text and unfaithful as translations. Of the _Mahawanso_ in particular, Mr. Turnour says, in a private letter which I have seen, that the early part of Upham's volume "is not a translation but a compendium of several works, and the subsequent portions a mutilated abridgment." The _Rajavali_, which is the most valuable of these volumes, was translated for Sir Alexander Johnston by Mr. Dionysius Lambertus Pereira, who was then Interpreter-Moodliar to the Cutchery at Matura. These English versions, though discredited as independent authorities, are not without value in so far as they afford corroborative support to the genuine text of the _Mahawanso_, and on this account I have occasionally cited them.]

From the data furnished by these, and from corroborative sources,[1] Turnour, in addition to many elaborate contributions drawn from the recesses of Pali learning in elucidation of the chronology of India, was enabled to prepare an _Epitome of the History of Ceylon,_ in which he has exhibited the succession and genealogy of one hundred and sixty-five kings, who filled the throne during 2341 years, extending from the invasion of the island from Bengal, by Wijayo, in the year B.C. 543 to its conquest by the British in 1798. In this work, after infinite labour, he has succeeded in condensing the events of each reign, commemorating the founders of the chief cities, and noting the erection of the great temples and Buddhist monuments, and the construction of some of those gigantic reservoirs and works for irrigation, which, though in ruins, arrest the traveller in astonishment at their stupendous dimensions. He thus effectually demonstrated the misconceptions of those who previously believed the literature of Ceylon to be destitute of historic materials.[2]

[Footnote 1: Besides the _Mahawanso, Rajaratnacari_, and _Rajavali_, the other native chronicles relied on by Turnour in compiling his epitome were the _Pujavali_, composed in the thirteenth century, the _Neekaasangraha_, written A.D. 1347, and the _Account of the Embassy to Siam_ in the reign of Raja Singha II., A.D. 1739-47, by WILBAAGEDERE MUDIANSE.]

[Footnote 2: By the help of TURNOUR'S translation of the _Mahawanso_ and the versions of the _Rajaratnacari_ and _Rajavali,_ published by Upham, two authors have since expanded the _Epitome_ of the former into something like a connected narrative, and those who wish to pursue the investigation of the early story of the island, will find facilities in the _History of Ceylon,_ published by KNIGHTON in 1845, and in the first volume of _Ceylon and its Dependencies,_ by PRIDHAM, London, 1849. To facilitate reference I have appended a _Chronological List of Singhalese Sovereigns,_ compiled from the historical epitome of Turnour. See Note B. at the end of this chapter.]

Besides evidence of a less definite character, there is one remarkable coincidence which affords grounds for confidence in the faithfulness of the purely historic portion of the Singhalese chronicles; due allowance being made for that exaggeration of style which is apparently inseparable from oriental recital. The circumstance alluded to is the mention in the _Mahawanso_ of the Chandragupta[1], so often alluded to by the Sanskrit writers, who, as Sir William Jones was the first to discover, is identical with Sandracottus or Sandracoptus, the King of the Prasii, to whose court, on the banks of the Ganges, Megasthenes was accredited as an ambassador from Seleucus Nicator, about 323 years before Christ. Along with a multitude of facts relating to Ceylon, the _Mahawanso_ contains a chronologically connected history of Buddhism in India from B.C. 590 to B.C. 307, a period signalized in classical story by the Indian expedition of Alexander the Great, and by the Embassy of Megasthenes to Palibothra,--events which in their results form the great link connecting the histories of the West and East, but which have been omitted or perverted in the scanty and perplexed annals of the Hindus, because they tended to the exaltation of Buddhism, a religion loathed by the Brahmans.

[Footnote 1: The era and identity of Sandracottus and Chandragupta have been accurately traced in MAX MÜLLER'S _History of Sanskrit Literature_, p. 298, &c.]

The Prasii, or people of Megadha, occupy a prominent place in the history of Ceylon, inasmuch as Gotama Buddha, the great founder of the faith of its people, was a prince of that country, and Mahindo, who finally established the Buddhist religion amongst them, was the great-grandson of Chandagutto, a prince whose name thus recorded in the _Mahawanso_[1] (notwithstanding a chronological discrepancy of about sixty years), may with little difficulty be identified with the "Chandragupta" of the Hindu Purána, and the "Sandracottus" of Megasthenes.

[Footnote 1: Mahawanso, ch. v. p. 21. See also WILSON'S _Notes to the Vishnu Purána_, p. 468.]

This is one out of the many coincidences which demonstrate the authenticity of the ancient annals of Ceylon; and from sources so venerable, and materials so abundant, I propose to select a few of the leading events, sufficient to illustrate the origin, and explain the influence of institutions and customs which exist at the present day in Ceylon, and which, from time immemorial, have characterised the inhabitants of the island.

NOTE (A.)

ANCIENT MAP OF CEYLON.

So far as I am aware, no map has ever been produced, exhibiting the comparative geography of Ceylon, and placing its modern names in juxtaposition with their Sanskrit and Pali.

NOTE (B.)

NATIVE SOVEREIGNS OF CEYLON.

N.B. The names of subordinate or cotemporary Princes are printed in _Italics_.

Names and Relationship of each succeeding Sovereign. Capital. Accession

B.C 1. Wejaya, founder of the Wejayan dynasty Tamananeuera 543 2. Upatissa 1st, minister--regent Upatissaneuera 505 3. Panduwása, paternal nephew of Wejaya ditto 504 _Ráma_ _Rámagona_ _Rohuna_ _Rohuna_ _Diggaina_ _Diggámadulla_ _Urawelli_ _Mahawelligama_ _Anurádha_ _Anurádhapoora_ _Wijitta_ _Wijittapoora_ [these six are brothers-in-law] 4. Abhaya, son of Paduwása, dethroned Upatissaneuera 474 Interregnum 454 5. Pandukábhaya, maternal grandson of Panduwása Anurádhapoora 437 6. Mutasiwa, paternal grandson ditto 367 7. Devenipiatissa, second son ditto 307 _Mahanága, brother_ _Mágama_ _Yatálatissa, son_ _Kellania_ _Gotábhaya, son_ _Mágama_ _Kellani-tissa, not specified_ _Kellania_ _Káwan-tissa, son of Gotábhaya_ _Mágama_ 8. Uttiya, fourth son of Mutasiwa Anurádhapoora 267 9. Mahasiwa, fifth do. ditto 257 10. Suratissa, sixth do. put to death ditto 247 11. Séna and Guttika, foreign usurpers--put to death ditto 237 12. Aséla, ninth son of Mutasiwa--deposed ditto 215 13. Elála, foreign usurper--killed in battle ditto 205 14. Dutugaimunu, son of _Káwantissa_ ditto 161 15. Saidaitissa, brother ditto 137 16. Tuhl or Thullathanaka, younger son--deposed ditto 119 17. Laiminitissa 1st or Lajjitissa, elder brother ditto 119 18. Kalunna or Khallátanága, brother--put to death ditto 109 19. Walagambáhu 1st or Wattagamini, brother--deposed ditto 104 20. [Five foreign usurpers--successively deposed and put to death] Pulahattha ditto 103 Báyiha ditto 100 Panayamárá ditto 98 Peliyamárá ditto 91 Dáthiya ditto 90 21. Walagambáhu 1st, reconquered the kingdom ditto 88 22. Mahadailitissa or Mahachula, son ditto 76 23. Chora Nága, son--put to death ditto 62 24. Kudá Tissa, son--poisoned by his wife ditto 50 25. Anulá, widow ditto 47 26. Makalantissa or Kallakanni Tissa, second son of Kudátissa ditto 41 27. Bátiyatissa 1st or Bátikábhaya, son ditto 19

Names and Relationship of Capital. Accession. each succeeding Sovereign. A.D. 28. Maha Dailiya Mána or Dáthika, brother Anurádhapoora 9 29. Addagaimunu or Amanda Gámini, son--put to death ditto 21 30. Kinibirridaila or Kanijáni Tissa, brother ditto 30 31. Kudá Abhá or Chulábhaya, son ditto 33 32. Singhawallí or Síwalli, sister--put to death ditto 34 Interregnum 35 33. Elluná or Ha Nága, maternal nephew of Addagaimunu ditto 38 34. Sanda Muhuna or Chanda Mukha Siwa, son ditto 44 35. Yasa Silo or Yatálakatissa, brother--put to death ditto 52 36. Subha, usurper--put to death ditto 60 37. Wahapp or Wasahba, descendant of Laiminitissa ditto 66 38. Waknais or Wanka Násica, son ditto 110 39. Gajábáhu 1st or Gámini, son ditto 113 40. Mahalumáná or Mallaka Nága, maternal cousin ditto 125 41. Bátiya Tissa 2nd or Bhátika Tissa, son ditto 131 42. Chula Tissa or Kanittbatissa, brother ditto 155 43. Kuhuna or Chudda Nága, son--murdered ditto 173 44. Kudanáma or Kuda Nága, nephew--deposed ditto 183 45. Kuda Siriná or Siri Nága 1st, brother-in-law ditto 184 46. Waiwahairatissa or Wairatissa, son--murdered ditto 209 47. Abhá Sen or Abhá Tissa, brother ditto 231 48. Siri Nága 2nd, son ditto 239 49. Weja Indu or Wejaya 2nd, son--put to death ditto 241 50. Sangatissa 1st, descendant of Laiminitissa--poisoned ditto 242 51. Dahama Sirisanga Bo or Sirisanga Bodhi 1st, do do.--deposed ditto 245 52. Golu Abhá, Gothábhaya or Megha warna Abhay, do. do. ditto 248 53. Makalan Detu Tissa 1st, son ditto 261 54. Maha Sen, brother ditto 275 55. Kitsiri Maiwan 1st or Kirtisri Megha warna, son ditto 302 56. Detu Tissa 2nd, brother ditto 330 57. Bujas or Budha Dása, son ditto 339 58. Upatissa 2nd, son ditto 368 59. Maha Náma, brother ditto 410 60. Senghot or Sotthi Sena, son--poisoned ditto 432 61. Laimini Tissa 2nd or Chatagáhaka, descendant of Laiminitissa ditto 432 62. Mitta Sena or Karalsora, not specified--put to death ditto 433 63. Pándu 24.9. Foreign usurpers ditto 434 Párinda Kuda 24.9. Foreign usurpers ditto 439 Khudda Párinda 24.9. Foreign usurpers ditto 455 Dátthiya 24.9. Foreign usurpers ditto 455 Pitthiya 24.9. Foreign usurpers ditto 458 64. Dásenkelleya or Dhátu Séna, descendant of the original royal family--put to death ditto 459 65. Sígiri Kasumbu or Kásyapa 1st, son--committed suicide Sigiri Galla Neuera 477

Names and Relationship of each succeeding Sovereign. Capital. Accession. A.D.

66. Mugallána 1st, brother Anurádhapoora 495 67. Kumára Dás or Kumára Dhátu Séna, son-immolated himself ditto 513 68. Kirti Séna, son-murdered ditto 522 69. Maidi Síwu or Síwaka, maternal uncle-murdered ditto 531 70. Laimini Upátissa 3rd, brother-in-law ditto 531 71. Ambaherra Salamaiwan or Silákála, son-in-law ditto 534 72. Dápulu 1st or Dátthápa Bhodhi, second son--committed suicide ditto 547 73. Dalamagalan or Mugallána 2nd, elder brother ditto 547 74. Kuda Kitsiri Maiwan 1st or Kirtisri Meg-hawarna, son-put to death ditto 567 75. Senewi or Maha Nága, descendant of the Okáka branch ditto 586 76. Aggrabodhi 1st or Akbo, maternal nephew ditto 589 77. Aggrabodhi 2nd or Sula Akbo, son-in-law ditto 623 78. Sanghatissa, brother-decapitated ditto 633 79. Buna Mugalan or Laimini Bunáya, usurper-put to death ditto 633 80. Abhasiggáhaka or Asiggáhaka, maternal grandson ditto 639 81. Siri Sangabo 2nd, son-deposed ditto 648 82. Kaluna Detutissa or Laimina Katuriya, descendant of Laiminitissa-committed Dewuneura suicide or Dondera 648 Siri Sangabo 2nd, restored, and again deposed Anurádhapoora 649 83. Dalupiatissa 1st or Dhatthopatissa, Laimini branch-killed in battle ditto 665 84. Paisulu Kasumbu or Kásyapa 2nd, brother of Sirisangabo ditto 677 85. Dapulu 2nd, Okáka branch-deposed ditto 686 86. Dalupiatissa 2nd or Hattha-Datthopatissa, son of Dalupiatissa 1st ditto 693 87. Paisulu Siri Sanga Bo 3rd or Aggrabodhi, brother ditto 702 88. Walpitti Wasidata or Dantanáma, Okáka branch ditto 718 89. Hununaru Riandalu or Hatthadátha, original royal family-decapitated ditto 720 90. Máhalaipánu or Mánawamma, do. do. ditto 720 91. Kásiyappa 3rd o Kasumbu, son ditto 726 92. Aggrabodhi 3rd or Akbo, nephew Pollonnarrua 729 93. Aggrabodhi 4th or Kudá Akbo, son ditto 769 94. Mahindu 1st or Salamaiwan, original royal family ditto 775 95. Dappula 2nd, son ditto 795 96. Mahindu 2nd or Dharmika-Sîlámaiga, son ditto 800 97. Aggrabodhi 5th or Akbo, brother ditto 804 98. Dappula 3rd or Kudá Dappula, son ditto 815 99. Aggrabodhi 6th, cousin ditto 831 100. Mitwella Sen or Silámaiga, son ditto 838 101. Kásiyappa 4th or Máganyin Séna or Mihindu, grandson ditto 858 102. Udaya 1st, brother ditto 891

Names and Relationship of Capital. Accession. each succeeding Sovereign. A.D. 103. Udaya 2nd, son Pollonnarrua 926 104. Kásiyappa 5th, nephew and son-in-law ditto 937 105. Kásiyappa 6th, son-in-law ditto 954 106. Dappula 4th, son ditto 964 107, Dappula 5th, not specified ditto 964 108. Udaya 3rd, brother ditto 974 109. Séna 2nd, not specified ditto 977 110. Udaya 4th, do. do. ditto 986 111. Séna 3rd, do. do. ditto 994 112. Mihindu 3rd, do. do ditto 997 113. Sèna 4th, son--minor ditto 1013 114. Mihindu 4th, brother--carried captive to Anurádhapoora 1023 India during the Sollean conquest Interregnum Sollean viceroyalty Pollonnarrua 1059 _Maha Lai or Maha_ } { _Lála Kirti_ } { _Rohuna_ _Wikrama Pándi_ } _Subordinate_ { _Kalutotta_ _Jagat Pándi or Jagati_ } _native kings_ { _Pála_ } _during the_ { _Rohuna_ _Prákrama Pándi or_ } _Sollean_ { _Prákhrama Báhu_ } _vice-royalty._ { _ditto_ _Lokaiswara_ } { _Kácharagama_ 115. Wejayabáhu 1st or Sirisangabo 4th, grandson of Mihindu 4th Pollonnarrua 1071 116. Jayabáhu 1st, brother ditto 1126 117. Wikramabáhu 1st } ditto } _ _Mánábarana_ } A disputed _Rohuna_ } 118. Gajábáhu 2nd } succession Pollonnarrua } 1127 _Siriwallaba or_} } _Kitsiri Maiwan_} _Rohuna_ } 119. Prákrama Báhu 1st, son of Mánábárana Pollonuarrua 1153 120. Wejayabáhu 2nd, nephew--murdered ditto 1186 121. Mihindu 5th or Kitsen Kisdas, usurper--put to death ditto 1187 122. Kirti Nissanga, a prince of Kálinga ditto 1187 Wírabáhu, son--put to death ditto 1196 123. Wikramabáhu 2nd, brother of Kirti Nissanga--put to death ditto 1196 124. Chondakanga, nephew--deposed ditto 1196 125. Lálawátí, widow of Prákramabáhu--deposed ditto 1197 126. Sáhasamallawa, Okáka branch--deposed ditto 1200 127. Kalyánawati, sister of Kirti Nissanga ditto 1202 128. Dharmásóka, not specified--a minor ditto 1208 129. Nayaanga or Nikanga, minister--put to death ditto 1209 Lílawatí, restored, and again deposed ditto 1209 130. Lokaiswera 1st, usurper--deposed ditto 1210 Lílawatí, again restored, and deposed a third time ditto 1211 131. Pandi Prákrama Báhu 2nd, usurper--deposed ditto 1211 132. Mágha, foreign usurper ditto 1214 133. Wejayabáhu 3rd, descendant of Sirisangabo 1st Dambadenia 1235 134. Kalikála Sahitya Sargwajnya or Pandita Prakrama Báhu 3rd, son ditto 1266 135. Bosat Wejaya Báhu 4th, son Pollonnarrua 1301

Names and Relationship of each succeeding Sovereign. Capital. Accession. A.D. _Bhuwaneka Báhu_ _Yapahu or Subbapabatto_ 136. Bhuwaneka Báhu 1st, brother ditto 1303 137. Prákrama Báhu 3rd, son of Bosat Wejayabáhu Pollonnarrua 1314 138. Bhuwaneka Báhu 2nd, son of Bhuwaneka Kurunaigalla or 1319 Báhu Hastisailapoora 139. Pandita Prákrama Báhu 4th, not specified ditto 140. Wanny Bhuwaneka Báhu 3rd, do. ditto 141. Wejaya Báhu 5th, do. ditto 142. Bhuwaneka Báhu 4th, do. Gampola or Gangásiripoora 1347 143. Prákrama Báhu 5th, do. ditto 1361 144. Wikram Báhu 3rd, cousin Partly at Kandy or Sengadagalla Neuera 1371 145. Bhuwaneka Báhu 5th, not specified Gampola or Gangásiripoora 1378 146. Wejaya Báhu 5th, or Wíra Báhu, do ditto 1398 147. Sri Prákrama Bahu 6th, do. Kotta or Jayawardanapoora 1410 148. Jayabáhu 2nd, maternal grandson--put to death ditto 1462 149. Bhuwaneka Báhu 6th, not specified ditto 1464 150. Pandita Prákrama Báhu 7th, adopted son ditto 1471 151. Wíra Prákrama Báhu 8th, brother of Bhuwaneka Báhu 6th ditto 1485 152. Dharma Prákrama Báhu 9th, son ditto 1505 153. Wejaya Báhu 7th, brother--murdered ditto 1527 _Jayawíra Bandára_ _Gampola_ 154. Bhuwaneka Báhu 7th, son Kotta 1534 _Máyádunnai_ _Setawacca_ _Raygam Bandára_ _Raygam_ _Jayawíra Bandára_ _Kandy_ 155. Don Juan Dharmapála Kotta 1542 _A Malabar_ _Yapahu_ _Portuguese_ _Colombo_ _Wídiye Rája_ _Pailainda Neuera_ _Rája Singha_ _Aiwissáwelle_ _Idirimáné Suriya_ _Seven Korles_ _Wikrama Báhu descendant of_ Sirisangabo 1st _Kandy_ 156. Rája Singha 1st, son of _Máyádunnai_ Setawacca 1581 _Jaya Suriya_ _Setawacca_ _Wídiye Rája's queen_ _ditto_ 157. Wimala Dharma, original royal family Khandy 1592 158. Senáraana or Senarat, brother ditto 1604 159. Rája-singha 2nd, son ditto 1637 _Kumára-singa, brother_ _Ouvah_ _Wejaya Pála, brother_ _Matelle_ 160. Wimala Dharma Suriya 2nd, son of Rájasingha Khandy 1687 161. Sriwíra Prákrama Narendrasingha or Kundasála ditto 1707 162. Sriwejaya Rája Singha or Hanguranketta, brother-in-law ditto 1739 163. Kirtisri Rája Singha, brother-in-law ditto 1747 164. Rajádhi Rája Singha, brother ditto 1781 165. Sri Wikrema Rája Singha, son of the late king's wife's sister, deposed by the English in 1815, and died in captivity in 1832 ditto 1798

NOTE.--The Singhalese vowels _a_, _e_, _i_, _o_, _u_ are to be pronounced as in French or Italian.

CHAP. II.

THE ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS OF CEYLON.

Divested of the insipid details which overlay them, the annals of Ceylon present comparatively few stirring incidents, and still fewer events of historic importance to repay the toil of their perusal. They profess to record no occurrence anterior to the advent of the last Buddha, the great founder of the national faith, who was born on the borders of Nepaul in the _seventh_ century before Christ.

In the theoretic doctrines of Buddhism "_Buddhas_"[1] are beings who appear after intervals of inconceivable extent; they undergo transmigrations extending over vast spaces of time, accumulating in each stage of existence an increased degree of merit, till, in their last incarnation as men, they attain to a degree of purity so immaculate as to entitle them to the final exaltation of "Buddha-hood," a state approaching to incarnate divinity, in which they are endowed with wisdom so supreme as to be competent to teach mankind the path to ultimate bliss.

[Footnote 1: A sketch of the Buddhist religion may be seen in Sir J. EMERSON TENNENT'S _History of Christianity in Ceylon_, ch. v. London, 1850. But the most profound and learned dissertations on Buddhism as it exists in Ceylon, will be found in the works of the Rev. R. SPENCE HARDY, _Eastern Monachism_, Lond. 1850, and _A Manual of Buddhism_, Lond. 1853.]

Their precepts, preserved orally or committed to writing, are cherished as _bana_ or the "_word_;" their doctrines are incorporated in the system of _dharma_ or "_truth_;" and, at their death, instead of entering on a new form of being, either corporeal or spiritual, they are absorbed into _Nirwana_, that state of blissful unconsciousness akin to annihilation which is regarded by Buddhists as the consummation of eternal felicity.

Gotama, who is represented as the last of the series of Buddhas[1], promulgated a religious system in India which has exercised a wider influence over the Eastern world than the doctrines of any other uninspired teacher in any age or country.[2] He was born B.C. 624 at Kapila-Vastu (a city which has no place in the geography of the Hindus, but which appears to have been on the borders of Nepaul); he attained his superior Buddha-hood B.C. 588, under a bo-tree[3] in the forest of Urawela, the site of the present Buddha Gaya in Bahar; and, at the age of eighty, he died at Kusinara, a doubtful locality, which it has been sought to identify with the widely separated positions of Delhi, Assam, and Cochin China.[4]

[Footnote 1: There were twenty-four Buddhas previous to the advent of Gotama, who is the fourth in the present Kalpa or chronological period. His system of doctrine is to endure for 5000 years, when it will be superseded by the appearance and preaching of his successor.--_Rajaratnacari_, ch. i. p. 42.]

[Footnote 2: HARDY'S _Eastern Monachism_, ch. i. p. 1. There is evidence of the widely-spread worship of Buddha in the remotely separated individuals with whom it has been sought at various times to identify him. "Thus it has been attempted to show that Buddha was the same as Thoth of the Egyptians, and Turm of the Etruscans, that he was Mercury, Zoroaster, Pythagoras, the Woden of the Scandinavians, the Manes of the Manichæans, the prophet Daniel, and even the divine author of Christianity." (PROFESSOR WILSON, _Journ. Asiat. Soc._, vol. xvi. p. 233.) Another curious illustration of the prevalence of his doctrines may be discovered in the endless variations of his name in the numerous countries over which his influence has extended: Buddha, Budda, Bud, Bot, Baoth, Buto, Budsdo, Bdho, Pout, Pote, Fo, Fod, Fohi, Fuh, Pet, Pta, Poot, Phthi, Phut, Pht, &c.--POCOCKE'S _India in Greece_, appendix, 397. HARDY'S _Buddhism_, ch. vii. p. 355. HARDY in his _Eastern Monachism_ says, "There is no country in either Europe or Asia, _except those that are Buddhist_, in which the same religion is now professed that was there existent at the time of the Redeemer's death," ch. xxii. p. 327.]

[Footnote 3: The Pippul, _Ficus religiosa_.]

[Footnote 4: Professor H.H. WILSON has identified Kusinara or Kusinagara with _Kusia_ in Gorakhpur, _Journ. Roy. Asiat. Soc._, vol xvi. p. 246.]

In the course of his ministrations Gotarna is said to have thrice landed in Ceylon. Prior to his first coming amongst them, the inhabitants of the island appear to have been living in the simplest and most primitive manner, supported on the almost spontaneous products of the soil. Gotama in person undertook their conversion, and alighted on the first occasion at Bintenne, where there exists to the present day the remains of a monument erected two thousand years ago[1] to commemorate his arrival. His second visit was to Nagadipo in the north of the island, at a place whose position yet remains to be determined; and the "sacred foot-print" on Adam's Peak is still worshipped by his devotees as the miraculous evidence of his third and last farewell.

[Footnote 1: By Dutugaimunu, B.C. 164. For an account of the present condition of this Dagoba at Bintenne, see Vol. II. Pt. IX. ch. ii.]

To the question as to what particular race the inhabitants of Ceylon at that time belonged, and whence or at what period the island was originally peopled, the Buddhist chronicles furnish no reply. And no memorials of the aborigines themselves, no monuments or inscriptions, now remain to afford ground for speculation. Conjectures have been hazarded, based on no sufficient data, that the Malayan type, which extends from Polynesia to Madagascar, and from Chin-India to Taheite, may still be traced in the configuration, and in some of the immemorial customs, of the people of Ceylon.[1]

[Footnote 1: Amongst the incidents ingeniously pressed into the support of this conjecture is the use by the natives of Ceylon of those _double canoes_ and _boats with outriggers_, which are never used on the Arabian side of India, but which are peculiar to the Malayan race in almost every country to which they have migrated; Madagascar and the Comoro islands, Sooloo, Luzon, the Society Islands, and Tonga. PRITCHARD'S _Races of Man_, ch. iv. p. 17. For a sketch of this peculiar canoe, see Vol. II. Pt. VII. ch. i.

There is a dim tradition that the first settlers in Ceylon arrived from the coasts of China. It is stated in the introduction to RIBEYRO'S _History of Ceylon_, but rejected by VALENTYN, ch, iv. p. 61.

The legend prefixed to RIBEYRO is as follows. "Si nous en croyons les historiens Portugais, les Chinois out été les premiers qui ont habité cette isle, et cela arriva de cette manière. Ces peuples étoient les maîtres du commerce de tout l'orient; quelques unes de leurs vaisseaux furent portéz sur les basses qui sont près du lieu, que depuis on appelle Chilao par corruption au lieu de Cinilao. Les équipages se sauvèrent à terre, et trouvant le pais bon et fertile ils s'y établirent: bientôt après ils s'allièrent avec les Malabares, et les Malabares y envoyoient ceux qu'ils exiloient et qu'ils nominoient _Galas_. Ces exiles s'étant confondus avec les Chinois, de deux noms n'en out fait qu'un, et se sont appellés _Chin-galas_ et ensuite Chingalais."--RIBEYRO, _Hist. de Ceylan_, pref. du trad.

It is only necessary to observe in reference to this hypothesis that it is at variance with the structure of the Singhalese alphabet, in which _n_ and _g_ form but one letter. DE BARROS and DE COUTO likewise adhere to the theory of a mixed race, originating in the settlement of Chinese in the south of Ceylon, but they refer the event to a period subsequent to the seizure of the Singhalese king and his deportation to China in the fifteenth century. DE BARROS, Dec. iii. ch. i.; DE COUTO, Dec. v. ch. 5.]

But the greater probability is, that a branch of the same stock which originally colonised the Dekkan extended its migrations to Ceylon. All the records and traditions of the peninsula point to a time when its nations were not Hindu; and in numerous localities[1], in the forests and mountains of the peninsula, there are still to be found the remnants of tribes who undoubtedly represent the aboriginal race.

[Footnote 1: LASSEN, _Indische Alterthumskunde_, vol. i. p. 199, 362.]

The early inhabitants of India before their comparative civilisation under the influence of the Aryan invaders, like the aborigines of Ceylon before the arrival of their Bengal conquerors, are described as mountaineers and foresters who were "rakshas" or demon worshippers; a religion, the traces of which are to be found to the present day amongst the hill tribes in the Concan and Canara, as well as in Guzerat and Cutch. In addition to other evidences of the community of origin of these continental tribes and the first inhabitants of Ceylon, there is a manifest identity, not alone in their popular superstitions at a very early period, but in the structure of the national dialects, which are still prevalent both in Ceylon and Southern India. Singhalese, as it is spoken at the present day, and, still more strikingly, as it exists as a written language in the literature of the island, presents unequivocal proofs of an affinity with the group of languages still in use in the Dekkan; Tamil, Telingu, and Malayalim. But with these its identification is dependent on analogy rather than on structure, and all existing evidence goes to show that the period at which a vernacular dialect could have been common to the two countries must have been extremely remote.[1]

[Footnote 1: The _Mahawanso_ (ch. xiv.) attests that at the period of Wijayo's conquest of Ceylon, B.C. 543, the language of the natives was different from that spoken by himself and his companions, which, as they came from Bengal, was in all probability Pali. Several centuries afterwards, A.D. 339, the dialect of the two races was still different; and some of the sacred writings were obliged to be translated from Pali into the Sihala language.--_Mahawanso_, ch. xxxvii. xxxviii. p. 247. At a still later period, A.D. 410; a learned priest from Magadha translated the Attah-Katha from Singhalese into Pali.--_Ib_. p. 253. See also DE ALWIS, _Sidath-Sangara_, p. 19.]

Though not based directly on either Sanskrit or Pali, Singhalese at various times has been greatly enriched from both sources, and especially from the former; and it is corroborative of the inference that the admixture was comparatively recent; and chiefly due to association with domiciliated strangers, that the further we go back in point of time the proportion of amalgamation diminishes, and the dialect is found to be purer and less alloyed. Singhalese seems to bear towards Sanskrit and Pali a relation similar to that which the English of the present day bears to the combination of Latin, Anglo-Saxon, and Norman French, which serves to form the basis of the language. As in our own tongue the words applicable to objects connected with rural life are Anglo-Saxon, whilst those indicative of domestic refinement belong to the French, and those pertaining to religion and science are borrowed from Latin[1]; so, in the language of Ceylon, the terms applicable to the national religion are taken from Pali, those of science and art from Sanskrit, whilst to pure Singhalese belong whatever expressions were required to denote the ordinary wants of mankind before society had attained organisation.[2]

[Footnote 1: See TRENCH on the _Study of Words_.]

[Footnote 2: See DE ALWIS, _Sidath-Sangara_, p. xlviii.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 543.]

Whatever momentary success may have attended the preaching of Buddha, no traces of his pious labours long survived him in Ceylon. The mass of its inhabitants were still aliens to his religion, when, on the day of his decease, B.C. 543, Wijayo[1], the discarded son of one of the petty sovereigns in the valley of the Ganges[2] effected a landing with a handful of followers in the vicinity of the modern Putlam.[3] Here he married the daughter of one of the native chiefs, and having speedily made himself master of the island by her influence, he established his capital at Tamana Neuera[4], and founded a dynasty, which, for nearly eight centuries, retained supreme authority in Ceylon.

[Footnote 1: Sometimes spelled _Wejaya_. TURNOUR has demonstrated that the alleged concurrence of the death of Buddha and the landing of Wijayo is a device of the sacred annalists, in order to give a pious interest to the latter event, which took place about sixty years later.--Introd _Mahawanso_, p. liii.]

[Footnote 2: To facilitate reference to the ancient divisions of India, a small map is subjoined, chiefly taken from Lassen's _Indische Alterthumskunde_.

[Footnote 3: BURNOUF conjectures that the point from which Wijayo set sail for Ceylon was the Godavery, where the name of Bandar-maha-lanka (the Port of the Great Lanka), still commemorates the event.--_Journ. Asiat._ vol. xviii. p. 134. DE COUTO, recording the Singhalese tradition as collected by the Portuguese, he landed at Preaturé (Pereatorre), between Trincomalie and Jaffna-patam, and that the first city founded by him was Mantotte.--_Decade_ v. l. 1. c. 5.]

[Footnote 4: See a note at the end of this chapter, on the landing of Wijayo in Ceylon, as described in the _Mahawanso_.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 543.]

The people whom he mastered with so much facility are described in the sacred books as _Yakkhos_ or "demons,"[1] and _Nagas_[2], or "snakes;" designations which the Buddhist historians are supposed to have employed in order to mark their contempt for the uncivilised aborigines[3], in the same manner that the aborigines in the Dekkan were denominated goblins and demons by the Hindus[4], from the fact that, like the Yakkhos of Ceylon, they too were demon worshippers. The Nagas, another section of the same superstition, worshipped the cobra de capello as an emblem of the destroying power. These appear to have chiefly inhabited the northern and western coasts of Ceylon, and the Yakkhos the interior[5]; and, notwithstanding their alleged barbarism, both had organised some form of government, however rude.[6] The Yakkhos had a capital which they called Lankapura, and the Nagas a king, the possession of whose "throne of gems"[7] was disputed by the rival sovereign of a neighbouring kingdom. So numerous were the followers of this gloomy idolatry of that time in Ceylon, that they gave the name of Nagadipo[8], _the_ _Island of Serpents_, to the portion of the country which they held, in the same manner that Rhodes and Cyprus severally acquired the ancient designation of _Ophiusa_, from the fact of their being the residence of the Ophites, who introduced serpent-worship into Greece.[9]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. vii.; FA HIAN, _Fo[)e]-kou[)e]-ki_, ch. xxxvii.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajavali_, p. 169.]

[Footnote 3: REINAUD, Introd. to _Abouldfeda_, vol. i. sec. iii. p. ccxvi. See also CLOUGH'S _Singhalese Dictionary_, vol. ii. p. 2.]

[Footnote 4: MOUNTSTUART ELPHINSTONE'S, _History of India_, b. iv. ch. xi. p. 216.]

[Footnote 5: The first descent of Gotama Buddha in Ceylon was amongst the Yakkhos at Bintenne; in his second visit he converted the "_Naga_ King of Kalany," near Colombo, _Mahawanso_, ch. i. p. 5.]

[Footnote 6: FABER, _Origin of Idolatry_, b. ii ch. vii. p. 440.]

[Footnote 7: _Mahawanso_, ch. i.]

[Footnote 8: TURNOUR was unable to determine the position on the modern map of the ancient territory of Nagadipo.--Introd. p. xxxiv. CASIE CHITTY, in a paper in the _Journal of the Ceylon Asiatic Society_, 1848, p. 71, endeavours to identify it with Jaffna, The _Rajaratnacari_ places it at the present Kalany, on the river of that name near Colombo (vol. ii. p. 22). The _Mahawanso_ in many passages alludes to the existence of Naga kingdoms on the continent of India, showing that at that time serpent-worship had not been entirely extinguished by Brahmanism in the Dekkan, and affording an additional ground for conjecture that the first inhabitants of Ceylon were a colony from the opposite coast of Calinga.]

[Footnote 9: BRYANT'S _Analysis of Mythology_, chapter on Ophiolatria, vol. i p. 480, "Euboea means _Oub-aia_, and signifies the serpent island." (_Ib_.)

But STRABO affords us a still more striking illustration of the _Mahawanso_, in calling the serpent worshippers of Ceylon "Serpents," since he states that in Phrygia and on the Hellespont the people who were styled [Greek: ophiogeneis], or the Serpent races, actually retained a physical affinity with the snakes with whom they were popularly identified, [Greek: "entautha mytheuousi tous Ophiogeneis syngenneian tina echein pros tous oseis."]--STRABO, lib. xiii. c. 588.

PLINY alludes to the same fable (lib. vii.). And OVID, from the incident of Cadmus' having sown the dragon's teeth (that is, implanted Ophiolatria in Greece), calls the Athenians _Serpentigenæ_.]

But whatever were the peculiarities of religion which distinguished the aborigines from their conquerors, the attention of Wijayo was not diverted from his projects of colonisation by any anxiety to make converts to his own religious belief. The earliest cares of himself and his followers were directed to implant civilisation, and two centuries were permitted to elapse before the first effort was made to supersede the popular worship by the inculcation of a more intellectual faith.

* * * * *

NOTE.

DESCRIPTION IN THE MAHAWANSO OF THE LANDING OF WIJAYO.

The landing of Wijayo in Ceylon is related in the 7th chapter of the _Mahawanso_, and Mr. TURNOUR has noticed the strong similarity between this story and Homer's account of the landing of Ulysses in the island of Circe. The resemblance is so striking that it is difficult to conceive that the Singhalese historian of the 5th century was entirely ignorant of the works of the Father of Poetry. Wijayo and his followers, having made good their landing, are met by a "devo" (a divine spirit), who blesses them and ties a sacred thread as a charm on the arm of each. One of the band presently discovers the princess in the person of a devotee, seated near a tank, and she being a magician (Yakkhini) imprisons him and eventually the rest of his companions in a cave. The _Mahawanso_ then proceeds: "all these persons not returning, Wijayo, becoming alarmed, equipping himself with the five weapons of war, proceeded after them, and examined the delightful pond: he could perceive no footsteps but those leading down into it, and there he saw the princess. It occurred to him his retinue must surely have been seized by her, and he exclaimed, 'Pray, why dost not thou produce my attendants?' 'Prince,' she replied, 'from attendants what pleasure canst thou derive? drink and bathe ere thou departest.' Seizing her by the hair with his left hand, whilst with his right he raised his sword, he exclaimed, 'Slave, deliver my followers or die.' The Yakkhini terrified, implored for her life; 'Spare me, prince, and on thee will I bestow sovereignty, my love, and my service.' In order that he might not again be involved in difficulty he forced her to swear[1], and when he again demanded the liberation of his attendants she brought them forth, and declaring 'these men must be famishing,' she distributed to them rice and other articles procured from the wrecked ships of mariners, who had fallen a prey to her. A feast follows, and Wijayo and the princess retire to pass the night in an apartment which she causes to spring up at the foot of a tree, curtained as with a wall and fragrant with incense." It is impossible not to be struck with a curious resemblance between this description and that in the 10th book of the Odyssey, where Eurylochus, after landing, returns to Ulysses to recount the fate of his companions, who, having wandered towards the palace of Circe, had been imprisoned after undergoing transformation into swine. Ulysses hastens to their relief, and having been provided by Mercury with antidotes, which enabled him to resist the poisons of the sorceress, whom he discovers in her retreat, the story proceeds:--

[Greek:

Ôs phat egô d aor oxu eryssamenos para mêrou Kirkêepêixa hôste ktameuai meneainôn. k. t. l.]

[Footnote 1: [Greek:

Ei mê moi tlaiês ge, thea, megan horkon homossai Mêti moi autps pêma kakon bouleusemen allo.]--_Odys_. x. l. 343.]

"She spake, I, drawing from beside my thigh The faulchion keen, with death denouncing looks, Rush'd on her,--she, with a shrill scream of fear, Ran under my raised arm, seized fast my knees, And in winged accents plaintive thus began:-- 'Who, whence thy city, and thy birth declare,-- Amazed I see thee with that potion drenched, Yet unenchanted: never man before Once passed it through his lips and lived the same. * * * * Sheath again Thy sword, and let us on my bed recline, Mutual embrace, that we may trust henceforth Each other without jealousy or fear.' The goddess spake, to whom I thus replied: 'Oh Circe, canst thou bid me meek become, And gentle, who beneath thy roof detain'st My fellow-voyagers. * * * No, trust me, never will I share thy bed, Till first, oh goddess, thou consent to swear That dread, all-binding oath, that other harm Against myself, thou wilt imagine none.' I spake, she, swearing as I bade, renounced All evil purpose, and her solemn oath Concluded, I ascended next her bed."[1]

[Footnote 1: COWPER's _Odyssey_, B. x, p. 392.]

The story of Wijayo's interview with Kuweni is told in nearly the same terms as it appeared in the _Mahawanso_ in the _Rajavali_, p. 172.

Another classical coincidence is curious: we are strongly reminded of Homer's description of the Syrens by the following passage, relative to the female _Rakshasis_, or demons, by whom Ceylon was originally inhabited, which is given in the memoirs of HIOUEN-THSANG, the Chinese traveller in the 7th century, as extracted by him from the Buddhist Chronicles. "Elles épiaient constamment les marchands qui abordaient dans l'isle, et se changeant en femmes d'une grande beauté elles venaient au-devant d'eux avec des fleurs odorantes et au son des instruments de musique, leur adressaient des paroles bienveillantes et les attiraient dans la ville de fer. Alors elles leur offraient un joyeux festin et se livraient au plaisir avec eux: puis elles les enfermaient dans un prison de fer et les mangeaient l'un après l'autre."[1]

[Footnote 1: HIOUEN-THSANG, _Mém. des Péler. Boudd_. 1. xi. p. 131.]

CHAP. III

THE CONQUEST OF CEYLON BY WIJAYO, B.C. 543, AND THE ESTABLISHMENT OF BUDDHISM, B.C. 307.

[Sidenote: B.C. 543.]

The sacred historians of Ceylon affect to believe in the assertion of some mysterious connection between the landing of Wijayo, and the conversion of Ceylon to Buddhism, one hundred and fifty years afterwards; and imply that the first event was but a pre-ordained precursor of the second.[1] The Singhalese narrative, however, admits that Wijayo was but a "lawless adventurer," who being expelled from his own country, was refused a settlement on the coast of India before he attempted Ceylon, which had previously attracted the attention of other adventurers. This story is in no way inconsistent with that told by the Chinese Buddhists, who visited the island in the fifth and seventh centuries. FA HIAN states, that even before the advent of Buddha, Ceylon was the resort of merchants, who repaired there to exchange their commodities for gems, which the "demons" and "serpents," who never appeared in person, deposited on the shore, with a specified value attached to each, and in lieu of them the strangers substituted certain indicated articles, and took their departure.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. vii.]

[Footnote 2: FA HIAN, _Fo[)e]-Kou[)e]-ki_, ch. xxxviii. See a notice of this story of FA HIAN, as it applies to the still existing habits of the Veddahs, Vol. I. Pt III. ch. vii.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 543.]

HIOUEN-THSANG, at a later period, disposes of the fables of Wijayo's descent from a lion[1], and of his divine mission to Ceylon, by intimating, that, according to certain authorities, he was the son of a merchant (meaning a sea-faring trader), who, having appeased the enmity of the Yakkhos, succeeded by his discretion in eventually making himself their king.[2]

[Footnote 1: The legend of Wijayo's descent from a lion, probably originated from his father being the son of an outlaw named "Singha."]

[Footnote 2: "Suivant certains auteurs, Sengkia-lo (Wijayo) serait le nom du fils d'un marchand, qui, par sa prudence, ayant échappé à la fureur homicide des Lo-tsa" (demons) "réussit ensuite à se faire Roi."--HIOUEN THSANG, _Voyages &c_. l. iv. p. 198.]

Whatever may have been his first intentions, his subsequent policy was rather that of an agriculturist than an apostle. Finding the country rich and fertile, he invited merchants to bring their families, and take possession of it.[1] He dispersed his followers to form settlements over the island, and having given to his kingdom his patrimonial name of Sihala[2], he addressed himself to render his dominions "habitable for men."[3] He treated the subjugated race of Yakkhos with a despotic disdain, referable less to pride of caste than to contempt for the rude habits of the native tribes. He repudiated the Yakkho princess whom he had married, because her unequal rank rendered her unfit to remain the consort of a king[4]; and though she had borne him children, he drove her out before his second marriage with the daughter of an Indian sovereign, on the ground that the latter would be too timid to bear the presence of a being so inferior.[5]

[Footnote 1: HIOUEN THSANG, ch iv.]

[Footnote 2: Whence Singhala (and Singhalese) Silan, Seylan, and Ceylon.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. vii p. 49. _Rajaratnacari_, ch. i.]

[Footnote 4: _Mahawanso_, ch. vii. p. 51.]

[Footnote 5: Ibid., p. 52.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 504.]

Leaving no issue to inherit the throne, he was succeeded by his nephew[1], who selected a relation of Gotama Buddha for his queen; and her brothers having dispersed themselves over the island, increased the number of petty kingdoms, which they were permitted to form in various districts[2], a policy which was freely encouraged by all the early kings, and which, though it served to accelerate colonisation and to extend the knowledge of agriculture, led in after years to dissensions, civil war, and disaster. It was at this period that Ceylon was resolved into the three geographical divisions, which, down to a very late period, are habitually referred to by the native historians. All to the north of the Mahawelli-ganga was comprised in the denomination _Pihiti_, or the Raja-ratta, from its containing the ancient capital and the residence of royalty; south of this was _Rohano_ or _Rahuna_, bounded on the east and south by the sea, and by the Mahawelli-ganga and Kalu-ganga, on the north and west; a portion of this division near Tangalle still retains the name of Roona.[3] The third was the _Maya-ratta_, which lay between the mountains, the two great rivers and the sea, having the Dedera-oya to the north, and the Kalu-ganga as its southern limit.

[Footnote 1: B.C. 504.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. vii. p. 51, ix. p. 57; _Rajavali_, part i. p. 177, 186; and TURNOUR'S _Epitome_, p. 12, 14.]

[Footnote 3: The district of Rohuna included the mountain zone of Ceylon, and hence probably its name, _rohuno_ meaning the "act or instrument of ascending, as steps or a ladder." Adam's Peak was in the Maya division; but Edrisi, who wrote in the twelfth century, says, that it was then called "El Rahoun."--_Géographie, &c_. viii, JAUBERT'S _Transl_. vol. ii. p. 71. _Rahu_ is an ordinary name for it amongst Mahometan writers, and in the _Raja Tarangini_, it is called "Rohanam," b. iii. 56, 72.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 504.]

The patriarchal village system, which from time immemorial has been one of the characteristics of the Dekkan, and which still prevails throughout Ceylon in a modified form, was one of the first institutions organised by the successors of Wijayo. "They fixed the boundaries of every village throughout Lanka;"[1] they "caused the whole island to be divided into fields and gardens;"[2] and so uniformly were the rites of these rural municipalities respected in after times, that one of the Singhalese monarchs, on learning that merit attached to alms given from the fruit of the donor's own exertions, undertook to sow a field of rice, and "from the portion derived by him as the cultivator's share," to bestow an offering on a "thero."[3]

[Footnote 1: It was established by Pandukabhaya, A.D. 437.--_Mahawanso_, ch. x. p. 67, _Rajaratnacari_, ch. i.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajaratnacari_, ch. ii., _Rajavali_, b. i. p. 185.]

[Footnote 3: The king was Mahachula, 77 B.C.--_Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv.]

From the necessity of providing food for their followers, the earliest attention of the Bengal conquerors was directed to the introduction and extension of agriculture. A passage in the _Mahawanso_ would seem to imply, that previous to the landing of Wijayo, rice was imported for consumption[1], and upwards of two centuries later the same authority specifies "one hundred and sixty loads of hill-paddi,"[2] among the presents which were sent to the island from Bengal.

[Footnote 1: Kuweni distributed to the companions of Wijayo; "rice and other articles, _procured from the wrecked ships of mariners_." (_Mahawanso_, ch. vii. p. 49.) A tank is mentioned as then existing near the residence of Kuweni; but it was only to be used as a bath. (Ib. c. vii. p. 48.) The _Rajaratnacari_ also mentions that, in the fabulous age of the second Buddha, of the present Kalpa, there was a famine in Ceylon, which dried up the cisterns and fountains of the inland. But there is no evidence of the existence of systematic tillage anterior to the reign of Wijayo.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xi. p. 70. _Paddi_ is rice before it has been freed from the husk.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 504.]

In a low and level country like the north of Ceylon, where the chief subsistence of the people is rice, a grain which can only be successfully cultivated under water, the first requisites of society are reservoirs and canals. The Buddhist historians extol the father of Wijayo for his judgment and skill "in forming villages in situations favourable for irrigation;"[1] his own attention was fully engrossed with the cares attendant on the consolidation of his newly acquired power; but the earliest public work undertaken by his successor Panduwasa, B.C. 504, was a tank, which he caused to be formed in the vicinity of his new capital Anarajapoora, the _Anurogrammum_ of Ptolemy, originally a village founded by one of the followers of Wijayo.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. vi. p. 46.]

[Footnote 2: The first tank recorded in Ceylon is the Abayaweva, made by Panduwasa, B.C. 505 (_Mahawanso_, ch. ix. p. 57). The second was the Jayaweva, formed by Pandukabhaya, B.C. 437. (Ib. ch. x. p. 65.) The _third_, the Gamini tank, made by the same king at the same place, Anarajapoora.--Ib. ch. x. p. 66.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 307.]

The continual recurrence of records of similar constructions amongst the civil exploits of nearly every succeeding sovereign, together with the prodigious number formed, alike attests the unimproved condition of Ceylon, prior to the arrival of the Bengal invaders, and the indolence or ignorance of the original inhabitants, as contrasted with the energy and skill of their first conquerors.

[Sidenote: B.C. 307.]

Upwards of two hundred years were spent in initiatory measures for the organisation of the new state. Colonists from the continent of India were encouraged by the facilities held out to settlers, and carriage roads were formed in the vicinity of the towns.[1] Village communities were duly organised, gardens were planted, flowers and fruit-bearing trees introduced,[2] and the production of food secured by the construction of canals,[3] and public works for irrigation. Moreover, the kings and petty princes attested the interest which they felt in the promotion of agriculture, by giving personal attention to the formation of tanks and to the labours of cultivation.[4]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xiv. xv. xvi.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xi. p. 60 (367 B.C.), ch. xxxiv. p. 211 (B.C. 20), ch. xxxv. p. 215 (A.D. 20). _Rajaratnacari_, ch. ii. p. 29. _Rajavali_, p. 185, 227.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. p. 210 (B.C. 42), ch. xxxv. p. 221, 222 (A.D. 275), ch. xxxvii. p. 238. _Rajaratnacari_, ch. ii. p. 49, and _Rajavali_, p. 223, &c.]

[Footnote 4: _Mahawanso_, ch. x. p. 61, xxii. p. 130, xxiv. p. 149. _Rajavali_, p. 185, 186. The Buddhist kings of Burmah, at the present day, in imitation of the ancient sovereigns of Ceylon, rest their highest claims to renown on the number of works for irrigation which they have either formed or repaired. See _Yule's Narrative of the British mission, to Ava in 1855_, p. 106.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 307.]

Meantime, the effects of Gotama's early visits had been obliterated, and the sacred trees which he planted were dead; and although the bulk of the settlers had come from countries where Buddhism was the dominant faith, no measures appear to have been taken by the immigrants to revive or extend it throughout Ceylon. Wijayo was, in all probability, a Brahman, but so indifferent to his own faith, that his first alliance in Ceylon was with a demon worshipper.[1] His immediate successors were so eager to encourage immigration, that they treated all religions with a perfect equality of royal favour. Yakkho temples were not only respected, but "annual demon offerings were provided" for them; halls were built for the worshippers of Brahma, and residences were provided at the public cost, for "five hundred persons of various foreign religious faiths;"[2] but no mention is made in the _Mahawanso_ of a single edifice having been then raised for the worshippers of Buddha, whether resident in the island, or arriving amongst the colonists from India.

[Footnote 1: According to the _Mahawanso_, Vishnu, in order to protect Wijayo and his followers from the sorceries of the Yakkhos, met them on their landing in Ceylon, and "_tied threads on their arms_," ch. vii.; and at a later period, when the king Panduwasa, B.C. 504, was afflicted with temporary insanity, as a punishment in his person of the crime of perjury, committed by his predecessor Wijayo, _Iswara_ was supplicated to interpose, and by his mediation the king was restored to his right mind.--_Rajavali_, p. 181.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. x. p. 67; ch, xxxiii, p. 203.]

It was not till the year B.C. 307, in the reign of Tissa, that the preacher Mahindo ventured to visit Ceylon, under the auspices of the king, whom he succeeded in inducing to abstain from Brahmanical rites, and to profess faith in the doctrines of Buddha. From the prominent part thus taken by Tissa in establishing the national faith of Ceylon, the sacred writers honour his name with the prefix of _Déwánan-pia_, or "beloved of the saints."

[Sidenote: B.C. 307.]

The _Mahawanso_ exhausts the vocabulary of ecstacy in describing the advent of Mahindo, a prince of Magadha, and a lineal descendant of Chandragutto. It records the visions by which he was divinely directed to "depart on his mission for the conversion of Lanka;" it describes his aërial flight, and his descent on Ambatthalo, the loftiest peak of Mihintala, the mountain which, rising suddenly from the plain, overlooks the sacred city of Anarajapoora. The story proceeds to explain, how the king, who was hunting the elk, was miraculously allured by the fleeing game to approach the spot where Mahindo was seated[1]; and how the latter forthwith propounded the Divine doctrine "to the ruler of the land; who, at the conclusion of his discourse, together with his forty thousand followers, obtained the salvation of the faith."[2]

[Footnote 1: The story, as related in the _Mahawanso_, bears a resemblance to the legend of St. Hubert and the stag, in the forest of Ardennes, and to that of St. Eustace, who, when hunting, was led by a deer of singular beauty towards a rock, where it displayed to him the crucifix upon its forehead; whence an appeal was addressed which effected his conversion. "The king Dewananpiyatissa departed for an elk hunt, taking with him a retinue; and in the course of the pursuit of the game on foot, he came to the Missa mountain. A certain devo, assuming the form of an elk, stationed himself there, grazing; the sovereign descried him, and saying 'it is not fair to shoot him standing,' sounded his bowstring, on which the elk fled to the mountain. The king gave chase to the flying animal, and, on reaching the spot where the priests were, the thero Mahindo came within sight of the monarch; but the metamorphosed deer vanished."--_Mahawanso_, c. xiv.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xiv. p. 80.]

Then follows the approach of Mahindo to the capital; the conversion of the queen and her attendants, and the reception of Buddhism by the nation, under the preaching of its great Apostle, who "thus became the luminary which shed the light of religion over the land." He and his sister Sanghamitta thenceforth devoted their lives to the organisation of Buddhist communities throughout Ceylon, and died in the odour of sanctity, in the reign of King Uttiya, B.C. 267.

[Sidenote: B.C. 289.]

But the grand achievement which consummated the establishment of the national faith, was the arrival from Magadha of a branch of the sacred Bo-tree. Every ancient race has had its sacred tree; the Chaldeans, the Hebrews[1], the Greeks, the Romans and the Druids, had each their groves, their elms and their oaks, under which to worship. Like them, the Brahmans have their _Kalpa tree_ in Paradise, and the Banyan in the vicinity of their temples; and the Buddhists, in conformity with immemorial practice, selected as their sacred tree the Pippul, which is closely allied to the Banyan, yet sufficiently distinguished from it, to serve as the emblem of a new and peculiar worship.[2] It was whilst reclining under the shade of this tree in Uruwela, that Gotama received Buddhahood; hence its adoption as an object of reverence by his followers, and in all probability its adoration preceded the use of images and temples in Ceylon.[3]

[Footnote 1: "They sacrifice upon the tops of mountains, and burn incense under oaks, and poplars, and elms, because the shadow thereof is good."--_Hosea_, iv. 13.]

[Footnote 2: The Bo-tree (_Ficus religiosa_) is the "pippul" of India. It differs from the Banyan (_F. indica_), by sending down no roots from its branches. Its heart-shaped leaves, with long attenuated points, are attached to the stem by so slender a stalk, that they appear in the profoundest calm to be ever in motion, and thus, like the leaves of the aspen, which, from the tradition that the cross was made of that wood, the Syrians believe to tremble in recollection of the events of the crucifixion, those of the Bo-tree are supposed by the Buddhists to exhibit a tremulous veneration, associated with the sacred scene of which they were the witnesses.]

[Footnote 3: Previous Buddhas had each his Bo-tree or Buddha-tree. The pippul had been before assumed by the first recorded Buddha; others had the iron-tree, the champac, the nipa, &c.--_Mahawanso_, TURNOUR'S Introd. p. xxxii.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 289.]

In order that his kingdom might possess a sacred tree of the supremest sanctity, king Tissa solicited a branch of the identical tree under which Gotama reclined, from Asoca, who then reigned in Magadha. The difficulty of severing a portion without the sacrilegious offence of "lopping it with any weapon," was overcome by the miracle of the branch detaching itself spontaneously, and descending with its roots into the fragrant earth prepared for it in a golden vase, in which it was transported by sea to Ceylon[1], and planted by king Tissa in the spot at Anarajapoora, where, after the lapse of more than 2000 years, it still continues to flourish and to receive the profound veneration of all Buddhist nations.[2]

[Footnote 1: The ceremonial of the mysterious severance of the sacred branch "amid the din of music, the clamours of men, the howling of the elements, the roar of animals, the screams of birds, the yells of demons, and the crash of earthquakes," is minutely described in an elaborate passage of the _Mahawanso_. And its landing in Ceylon, the retinue of its attendants, the homage paid to it, its progress to the capital, its arrival at the Northern-gate "at the hour when shadows are most extended," its reception by princes "adorned with the insignia of royalty," and its final deposition in the earth, under the auspices of Mahindo and his sister Sanghamitta, form one of the most striking episodes in that very singular book.--_Mahawanso_, ch. xviii. xix.]

[Footnote 2: The planting of the Bo-tree took place in the eighteenth year of the reign of King Devenipiatissa, B.C. 288; it is consequently at the present time 2147 years old.]

CHAP. IV.

THE EARLY BUDDHIST MONUMENTS.

[Sidenote: B.C. 289.]

Almost simultaneously with the establishment of the Buddhist religion was commenced the erection of those stupendous ecclesiastical structures, the number and magnitude of whose remains form a remarkable characteristic in the present aspect of the country.

The architectural history of continental India dates from the third century before Christ; not a single building or sculptured stone having as yet been discovered there, of an age anterior to the reign of Asoca[1], who was the first of his dynasty to abandon the religion of Brahma for that of Buddha. In like manner the earliest existing monuments of Ceylon belong to the same period; they owe their construction to Devenipiatissa, and the historical annals of the island record with pious gratitude the series of dagobas, wiharas, and temples erected by him and his successors.

[Footnote 1: FERGUSON, _Handbook of Architecture_, b. i. c. i. p. 5.]

Of these the most remarkable are the Dagobas, piles of brickwork of dimensions so extraordinary that they suggest comparison with the pyramids of Memphis[1], the barrow of Halyattys[2], or the mounds in the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates.

[Footnote 1: So vast did the dagobas appear to the Singhalese that the author of the _Mahawanso_, in describing the construction of that called the _Ruanwelle_ at Anarajapoora, states that each of the lower courses contained ten kotis (a koti being equal to 100 lacs) or 10,000,000 bricks.--_Mahawanso_, ch. xxx, p. 179.]

[Footnote 2: "The ancient edifices of Chi-Chen in Central America bear a striking resemblance to the topes of India. The shape of one of the domes, its apparent size, the small tower on the summit, the trees growing on the sides, the appearance of masonry here and there, the shape of the ornaments, and the small doorway at the base, are so exactly similar to what I had seen at Anarajapoora that when my eyes first fell on the engravings of these remarkable ruins I supposed that they were presented in illustration of the dagobas of Ceylon."--HARDY's _Eastern Monachism_, c. xix. p. 222.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 289.]

A dagoba (from _datu_, a relic, and _gabbhan_, a shrine[1]) is a monument raised to preserve one of the relics of Gotama, which were collected after the cremation of his body at Kusinara, and it is candidly admitted in the _Mahawanso_ that the intention in erecting them was to provide "objects to which offerings could be made."[2]

[Footnote 1: _Deha_, "the body," and _gopa_, "what preserves;" because they enshrine hair, teeth, nails, &c. of Buddha.--WILSON'S _Asiat. Res._ vol. xvii. p. 605.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xvii. p. 104.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 289.]

Ceylon contains but one class of these structures, and boasts no tall monolithic pillars like the _lats_ of Delhi and Allahabad, and no regularly built columns similar to the _minars_ of Cabul; but the fragments of the bones of Gotama, and locks of his hair, are enclosed in enormous masses of hemispherical masonry, modifications of which may be traced in every Buddhist country of Asia, in the topes of Affghanistan and the Punjaub, in the pagodas of Pegu, and in the Boro-Buddor of Java. Those of Ceylon consist of a bell-shaped dome of brick-work surmounted by a terminal or _tee_ (generally in the form of a cube supporting a pointed spire), and resting on a square platform approached by flights of stone steps. Those, the ruins of which have been explored in modern times, have been found to be almost solid, enclosing a hollow vessel of metal or stone which had once contained the relic, but of which the ornament alone and a few gems or discoloured pearls set in gold, are usually all that is now discoverable.

Their outline exhibits but little of ingenuity or of art, and their construction is only remarkable for the vast amount of labour which must necessarily have been expended upon them. But, independently of this, the first dagoba erected at Anarajapoora, the Thuparamaya, which exists to the present day, "as nearly as may be in the same form in which it was originally designed, is possessed of a peculiar interest from the fact that it is in all probability the oldest architectural monument now extant in India."[1] It was raised by King Tissa, at the close of the third century before Christ, over the collar-bone of Buddha, which Mahindo had procured for the king.[2] In dimensions this monument is inferior to those built at a later period by the successors of Tissa, some of which are scarcely exceeded in diameter and altitude by the dome of St. Peter's[3]; but in elegance of outline it immeasurably surpassed all the other dagobas, and the beauty of its design is still perceptible in its ruins after the lapse of two thousand years.

[Footnote 1: FERGUSON'S _Handbook of Architecture_, b. i. c. iii. p. 43.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xvii. _The Rajavali_ calls it the jaw-bone, p. 184.]

[Footnote 3: The Abhayagiri dagoba at Anarajapoora, built B.C. 89, was originally 180 cubits high, which, taking the Ceylon cubit at 2 feet 3 inches, would be equal to 405 feet. The dome was hemispherical, and described with a radius of 180 feet, giving a circumference of 1130 feet. The summit of this stupendous work was therefore fifty feet higher than St. Paul's, and fifty feet lower than St. Peter's.]

The king, in addition to this, built a number of others in various parts of Ceylon[1], and his name has been perpetuated as the founder of temples, for the rites of the new religion, and of Wiharas or monasteries for the residence of its priesthood. The former were of the simplest design, for an atheistical system, which substitutes meditation for worship, dispenses with splendour in its edifices and pomp in its ceremonial.

[Footnote 1: TURNOUR'S _Epitome_, p. 15.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 289.]

The images of Grotama, which in time became objects of veneration, were but a late innovation[1], and a doubt even been expressed whether the religion of Buddha in its primitive constitution, rejecting as it does the doctrine of a mediatorial priesthood, contemplated the existence of any organised ministry.

[Footnote 1: The precise date of their introduction is unknown, but the first mention of a statue occurs in an inscription on the rock at Mihintala, bearing date A.D. 246, and referring to the house constructed over a figure of Buddha.]

Caves, or insulated apartments in imitation of their gloom and retirement, were in all probability the first resort of devotees in Ceylon, and hence amongst the deeds of King Tissa, the most conspicuous and munificent were the construction of rock temples, on Mihintala, and of apartments for the priests in all parts of his dominions.[1]

[Footnote 1: TURNOUR's _Epitome_, p. 15.]

The directions of Gotama as to the residence of his votaries are characterised by the severest simplicity, and the term "pansala," literally "a dwelling of leaves,"[1] by which the house of a priest is described to the present day, serves to illustrate the original intention that persons dedicated to his service should cultivate solitude and meditation by withdrawing into the forest, but within such a convenient distance as would not estrange them from the villagers, on whose bounty and alms they were to be dependent for subsistence.

[Footnote 1: It is questionable whether the Sarmanai, mentioned by Megasthenes, were Buddhists or Brahmans; but the account which he gives of the class of them whom he styles the Hylobii, would seem to identify them with the Sramanas of Buddhism, "passing their lives in the woods, [Greek: zôntes en tais ulais], living on fruits and seeds, and clothed with the bark of trees."--MEGASTHENES' _Indica_, &c., Fragm. xlii.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 289.]

In one of the rock inscriptions deciphered by Prinsep, King Asoca, in addressing himself to his Buddhist subjects, distinguishes them as "ascetics and _house-holders_." In the sacred books a laic is called a "graha pali," meaning "the ruler of a house;" and in contra-distinction Fa Hian, the Chinese Buddhist, speaks of the priests of Ceylon under the designation of "the house-less," to mark their abandonment of social enjoyments.[1] Anticipating the probable necessity of their eventually resorting to houses for accommodation, Buddha directed that, if built for an individual, the internal measurement of a cell should be twelve spans in length by seven in breadth[2]; and, if restricted to such dimensions, the assertions of the Singhalese chronicles become intelligible as to the prodigious number of such dwellings said to have been raised by the early kings.[3]

[Footnote 1: "Les hommes hors de leur maisons."--FA HIAN, _Fo[)e] Kou[)e] Ki_, ch. xxxix. This is the equivalent of the Singhalese term for the same class, _agariyan-pubbajito_, used in the Pittakas.]

[Footnote 2: HARDY'S _Eastern Monachism_, ch. xiii. p. 122.]

[Footnote 3: The _Rajaratnacari_ says that Devenipiatissa caused _eighty-four thousand_ temples to be built during his reign, p. 35.]

But the multitudes who were thus attracted to a life of indolent devotion became in a short time so excessive that recourse was had to other devices for combining economy with accommodation, and groups of such cells were gradually formed into wiharas and monasteries, the inmates of which have uniformly preserved their organisation and order. Still the edifices thus constructed have never exhibited any tendency to depart from the primitive simplicity so strongly enjoined by their founder; and, down to the present time, the homes of the Buddhist priesthood are modest and humble structures generally reared of mud and thatch, with no pretension to external beauty and no attempt at internal decoration.

[Sidenote: B.C. 289.]

To supply to the ascetics the means of seclusion and exercise, the early kings commenced the erection of ambulance-halls; and gardens were set apart for the use of the great temple communities. The _Mahawanso_ describes, with all the pomp of Oriental diction, the ceremony observed by King Tissa on the occasion of setting apart a portion of ground as a site for the first wihara at his capital; the monarch in person, attended by standard bearers and guards with golden staves, having come to mark out the boundary with a plough drawn by elephants.[1] A second monastery was erected by him on the summit of Mihintala[2]; a third was attached to the dagoba of the Thuparamaya, and others were rapidly founded in every quarter of the island.[3]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xv. p. 99.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xx. p. 123.]

[Footnote 3: Five hundred were built by one king alone, the third in succession from Devenipiatissa, B.C. 246 (_Mahawanso_, ch. xxi, p. 127). About the same period the petty chiefs of Rohuna and Mahagam were equally zealous in their devout labours, the one having erected sixty-four wiharas in the east of the island, and the other sixty-eight in the south.--_Mahawanso_, ch. xxiv. p. 145, 148.]

It was in all probability owing to the growth of these institutions, and the establishment of colleges in connection with them, that halls were eventually appropriated for the reception of statues; and that apartments so consecrated were devoted to the ceremonies and worship of Buddha. Hence, at a very early period, the dwellings of the priests were identified with the chaityas and sacred edifices, and the name of the Wihara came to designate indifferently both the temple and the monastery.

But the hall which contains the figures of Buddha, and which constitutes the "temple" proper, is always detached from the domestic buildings, and is frequently placed on an eminence from which the view is commanding. The interior is painted in the style of Egyptian chambers, and is filled with figures and illustrations of the legends of Gotama, whose statue, with hand uplifted in the attitude of admonition, or reclining in repose emblematic of the blissful state of Nirwana, is placed in the dimmest recess of the edifice. Here lamps cast a feeble light, and the air is heavy with the perfume of flowers, which are daily renewed by fresh offerings from the worshippers at the shrines.

[Sidenote: B.C. 289.]

In no other system of idolatry, ancient or modern, have the rites been administered by such a multitude of priests as assist in the passionless ceremonial of Buddhism. Fa Hian, in the fourth century, was assured by the people of Ceylon that at that period the priests numbered between fifty and sixty thousand, of whom two thousand were attached to one wihara at Anarajapoora, and three thousand to another.[1]

[Footnote 1: FA HIAN, _Fo[)e] Kou[)e] Ki_, ch. xxxviii. p. 336, 350. At the present day the number in the whole island does not probably exceed 2500 (HARDY'S _Eastern Monachism_, p. 57, 309). But this is far below the proportion of the Buddhist priesthood in other countries; in Siam nearly every adult male becomes a priest for a certain portion of his life; a similar practice prevails in Ava; and in Burmah so common is it to assume the yellow robe, that the popular expedient for effecting divorce is for the parties to make a profession of the priesthood, the ceremonial of which is sufficient to dissolve the marriage vow, and after an interval of a few months, they can throw off the yellow robe and are then at liberty to marry again.]

As the vow which devotes the priests of Buddha to religion binds them at the same time to a life of poverty and mendicancy, the extension of the faith entailed in great part on the crown the duty of supporting the vast crowds who withdrew themselves from industry to embrace devotion and indigence. They were provided with food by the royal bounty, and hence the historical books make perpetual reference to the priests "going to the king's house to eat,"[1] when the monarch himself set the example to his subjects of "serving them with rice broth, cakes, and dressed rice."[2] Rice in all its varieties is the diet described in the _Mahawanso_ as being provided for the priesthood by the munificence of the kings; "rice prepared with sugar and honey, rice with clarified butter, and rice in its ordinary form."[3] In addition to the enjoyment of a life of idleness, another powerful incentive conspired to swell the numbers of these devotees. The followers and successors of Wijayo preserved intact the institution of caste, which they had brought with them from the valley of the Ganges; and, although caste was not abolished by the teachers of Buddhism, who retained and respected it as a social institution, it was practically annulled and absorbed in the religious character;--all who embraced the ascetic life being simultaneously absolved from all conventional disabilities, and received as members of the sacred community with all its exalted prerogatives.[4]

[Footnote 1: _Rajavali_, p. 198. Hiouen Thsang, the Chinese pilgrim, describing Anarajapoora in the seventh century, says: "A côté du palais du roi; on a construit une vaste cuisine où l'on prépare chaque jour des aliments pour dix-huit mille religieux. A l'heure de repas, les religieux viennent, un pot à la main, pour recevoir leur nourriture. Après l'avoir obtenue ils s'en retournent chacun dans leur chambre."--HIOUEN THSANG, _Transl._ M. JULIEN, lib. xi. tom. ii. p. 143.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xiv. p. 82.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxii.; _Rajaratnacari_, ch. i. p. 37, ch. ii. p. 56, 60, 62.]

[Footnote 4: Professor Wilson, _Journ. Roy. Asiat. Soc._ vol. xvi. p. 249.]

Along with food, clothing consisting of three garments to complete the sacerdotal robes, as enjoined by the Buddhist ritual[1], was distributed at certain seasons; and in later times a practice obtained of providing robes for the priests by "causing the cotton to be picked from the tree at sunrise, cleaned, spun, woven, dyed yellow, and made into garments and presented before sunset."[2] The condition of the priesthood was thus reduced to a state of absolute dependency on alms, and at the earliest period of their history the vow of poverty, by which their order is bound, would seem to have been righteously observed.

[Footnote 1: To avoid the vanity of dress or the temptation to acquire property, no Buddhist priest is allowed to have more than one set of robes, consisting of three pieces, and if an extra one be bestowed on him it must be surrendered to the chapter of his wihara within ten days. The dimensions must not exceed a specified length, and when obtained new the cloth must be disfigured with mud or otherwise before he puts it on. A magnificent robe having been given to Gotama, his attendant Ananda, in order to destroy its intrinsic value, cut it into thirty pieces and sewed them together in four divisions, so that the robe resembled the patches of a rice-field divided by embankments. And in conformity with this precedent the robes of every priest are similarly dissected and reunited.--Hardy's _Eastern Monachism_, c. xii. p. 117; _Rajaratnacari_, ch. ii. pp. 60, 66.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajaratnacari_, pp. 104, 109, 112. The custom which is still observed in Ceylon, of weaving robes between sunrise and sunset is called _Catina dhwana_ (_Rajavali_, p. 261). The work is performed chiefly by women, and the practice is identical with that mentioned by Herodotus, as observed by the priests of Egypt, who celebrated a festival in honour of the return of Rhampsinitus, after playing at dice with Ceres in Ilades, by investing one of their body with a cloak made in a single day, [Greek: pharos autêmeron exyphênantes], _Euterpe_, cxxii. Gray, in his ode of _The Fatal Sisters_, has embodied the Scandinavian myth in which the twelve weird sisters, the _Valkiriur_, weave "the crimson web of war" between the rising and setting of the sun.]

CHAP V.

SINGHALESE CHIVALRY.--ELALA AND DUTUGAIMUNU.

[Sidenote: B.C. 289.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 266.]

For nearly a century after the accession of Devenipiatissa, the religion and the social development of Ceylon thus exhibited an equally steady advancement. The cousins of the king, three of whom ascended the throne in succession, seem to have vied with each other in works of piety and utility. Wiharas were built in all parts of the island, both north and south of the Maha-welli-ganga. Dagobas were raised in various places, and cultivation was urged forward by the formation of tanks and canals. But, during this period, from the fact of the Bengal immigrants being employed in more congenial or more profitable occupations (possibly also from the numbers who were annually devoting themselves to the service of the temples), and from the ascertained inaptitude of the native Singhalese to bear arms, a practice was commenced of retaining foreign mercenaries, which, even at that early period, was productive of animosity and bloodshed, and in process of time led to the overthrow of the Wijayan dynasty and the gradual decay of the Sinhala sovereignty.

[Sidenote: B.C. 266.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 237.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 205.]

The genius of the Gangetic race, which had taken possession of Ceylon, was essentially adapted to agricultural pursuits--in which, to the present day, their superiority is apparent over the less energetic tribes of the Dekkan. Busied with such employments, the early colonists had no leisure for military service; besides, whilst Devenipiatissa and his successors were earnestly engaged in the formation of religious communities, and the erection of sacred edifices in the northern portion of the island, various princes of the same family occupied themselves in forming settlements in the south and west; and hence, whilst their people were zealously devoted to the service and furtherance of religion, the sovereign at Anarajapoora was compelled, through a combination of causes, to take into his pay a body of Malabars[1] for the protection both of the coast and the interior. Of the foreigners thus confided in, "two youths, powerful in their cavalry and navy, named Sena and Gottika,"[2] proved unfaithful to their trust, and after causing the death of the king Suratissa (B.C. 237), retained the supreme power for upwards of twenty years, till overthrown in their turn and put to death by the adherents of the legitimate line.[3] Ten years, however, had barely elapsed when the attempt to establish a Tamil sovereign was renewed by Elala, "a Malabar of the illustrious Uju tribe, who invaded the island from the Chola[4] country, killed the reigning king Asela, and ruled the kingdom for forty years, administering justice impartially to friends and foes."

[Footnote 1: The term "Malabar" is used throughout the following pages in the comprehensive sense in which it is applied in the Singhalese chronicles to the continental invaders of Ceylon; but it must be observed that the adventurers in these expeditions, who are styled in the _Mahawanso, "damilos"_ or Tamils, came not only from the south-western tract of the Dekkan, known in modern geography as "Malabar," but also from all parts of the peninsula, as far north as Cuttack and Orissa.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxi. p. 127.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, xxi.; _Rajaratnacari_, ch. ii.]

[Footnote 4: Chola, or Solee, was the ancient name of Tanjore, and the country traversed by the river Caveri.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 161.]

Such is the encomium which the _Mahawanso_ passes on an infidel usurper, because Elala offered his protection to the priesthood; but the orthodox annalist closes his notice of his reign by the moral reflection that "even he who was an heretic, and doomed by his creed to perdition, obtained an exalted extent of supernatural power from having eschewed impiety and injustice."[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, xxi. p. 129. The other historical books, the _Rajavali_, and _Rajaratnacari_, give a totally different character of Elala, and represent him as the desecrator of monuments and the overthrower of temples. The traditional estimation which has followed his memory is the best attestation of the superior accuracy of the _Mahawanso_.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 161.]

But it was not the priests alone who were captivated by the generosity of Elala. In the final struggle for the throne, in which the Malabars were worsted by the gallantry of Dutugaimunu, a prince of the excluded family, the deeds of bravery displayed by him were the admiration of his enemies. The contest between the rival chiefs is the solitary tale of Ceylon chivalry, in which Elala is the Saladin and Dutugaimunu the Coeur-de-lion. So genuine was the admiration of Elala's bravery that his rival erected a monument in his honour, on the spot where he fell; its ruins remain to the present day, and the Singhalese still regard it with respect and veneration. "On reaching the quarter of the city in which it stands," says the _Mahawanso_[1], "it has been the custom for the monarchs of Lanka to silence their music, whatsoever cession they may be heading;" and so uniformly was the homage continued down to the most recent period, that so lately as 1818, on the suppression of an attempted rebellion, when the defeated aspirant to the throne was making his escape by Anarajapoora, he alighted from his litter, on approaching the quarter in which the monument was known to exist, "and although weary and almost incapable of exertion, not knowing the precise spot, he continued on foot till assured that he had passed far beyond the ancient memorial."[2]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxi.]

[Footnote 2: FORBES' _Eleven Years in Ceylon_, vol. i. p. 233.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 161.]

Dutugaimunu, in the epics of Buddhism, enjoys a renown, second only to that of King Tissa, as the champion of the faith. On the recovery of his kingdom he addressed himself with energy to remove the effects produced in the northern portions of the island by forty years of neglect and inaction under the sway of Elala. During that monarch's protracted usurpation the minor sovereignties, which had been formed in various parts of the island prior to his seizure of the crown, were little impeded in their social progress by the forty-four years' residence of the Malabars at Anarajapoora. Although the petty kings of Rohuna and Maya submitted to pay tribute to Elala, his personal rule did not extend south of the Mahawelli-ganga[1], and whilst the strangers in the north of the island were plundering the temples of Buddha, the feudal chiefs in the south and west were emulating the munificence of Tissa in the number of wiharas which they constructed.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxii., _Rajavali_, p. 188, _Rajaratnacari_, p. 36. The _Mahawanso_ has a story of Dutugaimunu, when a boy, illustrative of his early impatience to rid the island of the Malabars. His father seeing him lying on his bed, with his hands and feet gathered up, inquired, "My boy, why not stretch thyself at length on thy bed?" "Confined by the Damilos," he replied, "beyond the river on the one side, and by the unyielding ocean on the other, how can I lie with outstretched limbs?"]

Eager to conciliate his subjects by a similar display of regard for religion, Dutugaimunu signalised his victory and restoration by commencing the erection of the Ruanwellé dagoba, the most stupendous as well as the most venerated of those at Anarajapoora, as it enclosed a more imposing assemblage of relics than were ever enshrined in any other in Ceylon.

The mass of the population was liable to render compulsory labour to the crown; but wisely reflecting that it was not only derogatory to the sacredness of the object, but impolitic to exact any avoidable sacrifices from a people so recently suffering from internal warfare, Dutugaimunu came to the resolution of employing hired workmen only, and according to the _Mahawanso_ vast numbers of the Yakkhos became converts to Buddhism during the progress of the building[1], which the king did not live to complete.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxviii. xxix. xxx. xxxi.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 161.]

But the most remarkable of the edifices which he erected at the capital was the Maha-Lowa-paya, a monastery which obtained the name of the _Brazen Palace_ from the fact of its being roofed with plates of that metal. It was elevated on sixteen hundred monolithic columns of granite twelve feet high, and arranged in lines of forty, so as to cover an area of upwards of two hundred and twenty feet square. On these rested the building nine stories in height, which, in addition to a thousand dormitories for priests, contained halls and other apartments for their exercise and accommodation.

The _Mahawanso_ relates with peculiar unction the munificence of Dutugaimunu in remunerating those employed upon this edifice; he deposited clothing for that purpose as well as "vessels filled with sugar, buffalo butter and honey;" he announced that on this occasion it was not fitting to exact unpaid labour, and, "placing high value on the work to be performed, he paid the workmen with money."[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxvii. p. 163.]

The structure, when completed, far exceeded in splendour anything recorded in the sacred books. All its apartments were embellished with "beads, resplendent like gems;" the great hall was supported by golden pillars resting on lions and other animals, and the walls were ornamented with festoons of pearls and of flowers formed of jewels; in the centre was an ivory throne, with an emblem on one side of a golden sun, and on the other of the moon in silver, and above all glittered the imperial "chatta," the white canopy of dominion. The palace, says the _Mahawanso_, was provided with rich carpets and couches, and "even the ladle of the rice boiler was of gold."

[Sidenote: B.C. 161.]

The vicissitudes and transformations of the Brazen Palace are subjects of frequent mention in the history of the sacred city. As originally planned by Dutugaimunu, it did not endure through the reign of his successor Saidaitissa, at whose expense it was reconstructed, B.C. 140, but the number of stories was lowered to seven.[1] More than two centuries later, A.D. 182, these were again reduced to five[2], and the entire building must have been taken down in A.D. 240, as the king who was then reigning caused "the pillars of the Lowa Pasado to be arranged in a different form."

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxvi.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiii.]

The edifice erected on its site was pulled to the ground by the apostate Maha Sen, A.D. 301[1]; but penitently reconstructed by him on his recantation of his errors. Its last recorded restoration took place in the reign of Prakrama-bahu, towards the close of the twelfth century, when "the king rebuilt the Lowa-Maha-paya, and raised up the 1600 pillars of rock."

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxvii.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 161.]

Thus exposed to spoliation by its splendour, and obnoxious to infidel invaders from the religious uses to which it was dedicated, it was subjected to violence on every commotion, whether civil or external, which disturbed the repose of the capital; and at the present day, no traces of it remain except the indestructible monoliths on which it stood. A "world of stone columns," to use the quaint expression of Knox, still marks the site of the Brazen Palace of Dutugaimunu, and attests the accuracy of the chronicles which describe its former magnificence.

[Sidenote: B.C. 137.]

The character of Dutugaimunu is succinctly expressed in his dying avowal, that he had lived "a slave to the priesthood."[1] Before partaking of food, it was his practice to present a portion for their use; and recollecting in maturer age, that on one occasion, when a child, he had so far forgotten this invariable rule, as _to eat a chilly_ without sharing it with the priest, he submitted himself to a penance in expiation of this youthful impiety.[2] His death scene, as described in the _Mahawanso_, contains an enumeration of the deeds of piety by which his reign had been signalised.[3] Extended on his couch in front of the great dagoba which he had erected, he thus addressed one of his military companions who had embraced the priesthood: "In times past, supported by my ten warriors, I engaged in battles; now, single-handed, I commence my last conflict, with death; and it is not permitted to me to overcome my antagonist." "Ruler of men," replied the thero, "without subduing the dominion of sin, the power of death is invincible; but call to recollection thy acts of piety performed, and from these you will derive consolation." The secretary then "read from the register of deeds of piety," that "one hundred wiharas, less one, had been constructed by the Maharaja, that he had built two great dagobas and the Brazen Palace at Anarajapoora; that in famines he had given his jewels to support the pious; that on three several occasions he had clothed the whole priesthood throughout the island, giving three garments to each; that five times he had conferred the sovereignty of the land for the space of seven days on the National Church; that he had founded hospitals for the infirm, and distributed rice to the indigent; bestowed lamps on innumerable temples, and maintained preachers, in the various wiharas, in all parts of his dominions. 'All these acts,' said the dying king, 'done in my days of prosperity, afford no comfort to my mind; but two offerings which I made when in affliction and in adversity, disregardful of my own fate, are those which alone administer solace to me now.[4] After this, the pre-eminently wise Maharaja expired, stretched on his bed, in the act of gazing on the Mahatupo."[5]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxii.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxiv, xxv.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxii.]

[Footnote 4: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxii.]

[Footnote 5: Another name for the Ruanwellé dagoba, which he had built.]

CHAP. VI.

THE INFLUENCE OF BUDDHISM ON CIVILISATION.

[Sidenote: B.C. 137.]

After the reign of Dutugaimunu there is little in the pages of the native historians to sustain interest in the story of the Singhalese monarchs. The long line of sovereigns is divided into two distinct classes; the kings of the _Maha-wanse_ or "superior dynasty" of the uncontaminated blood of Wijayo, who occupied the throne from his death, B.C. 505, to that of Maha Sen, A.D. 302;--and the _Sulu-wanse_ or "inferior race," whose descent was less pure, but who, amidst invasions, revolutions, and decline, continued, with unsteady hand, to hold the government clown to the occupation of the island by Europeans in the beginning of the sixteenth century.

[Sidenote: B.C. 137.]

To the great dynasty, and more especially to its earliest members, the inhabitants were indebted for the first rudiments of civilisation, for the arts of agricultural life, for an organised government, and for a system of national worship. But neither the piety of the kings nor their munificence sufficed to conciliate the personal attachment of their subjects, or to strengthen their throne by national attachment such as would have fortified its occupant against the fatalities incident to despotism. Of fifty-one sovereigns who formed the pure Wijayan dynasty, two were deposed by their subjects, and nineteen put to death by their successors.[1] Excepting the rare instances in which a reign was marked by some occurrence, such as an invasion and repulse of the Malabars, there is hardly a sovereign of the "Solar race" whose name is associated with a higher achievement than the erection of a dagoba or the formation of a tank, nor one whose story is enlivened by an event more exciting than the murder through which he mounted the throne or the conspiracy by which he was driven from it.[2]

[Footnote 1: There is something very striking in the facility with which aspirants to the throne obtained the instant acquiescence of the people, so soon as assassination had put them in possession of power. And this is the more remarkable, where the usurpers were of the lower grade, as in the instance of Subho, a gate porter, who murdered King Yasa Silo, A.D. 60, and reigned for six years (_Mahaw._ ch. xxxv. p. 218). A carpenter, and a carrier of fire-wood, were each accepted in succession as sovereigns, A.D. 47; whilst the "_great dynasty_" was still in the plenitude of its popularity. The mystery is perhaps referable to the dominant necessity of securing tranquillity at any cost, in the state of society where the means of cultivation were directly dependent on the village organisation, and famine and desolation would have been the instant and inevitable consequences of any commotions which interfered with the conservancy and repair of the tanks and means of irrigation, and the prompt application of labour to the raising and saving of produce at the instant when the fall of the rains or the ripening of the crops demanded its employment with the utmost vigour.]

[Footnote 2: In theory the Singhalese monarchy was elective in the descendants of the Solar race: in practice, primogeniture had a preference, and the crown was either hereditary or became the prize of those who claimed to be of royal lineage. On reviewing the succession of kings from B.C. 307 to A.D. 1815, _thirty-nine_ eldest sons (or nearly one fourth), succeeded to their fathers: and _twenty-nine_ kings (or more than one fifth), were succeeded by brothers. _Fifteen_ reigned for a period less than one year, and thirty for more than one year, and less than four. Of the Singhalese kings who died by violence, twenty-two were murdered by their successors; six were killed by other individuals; thirteen fell in feuds and war, and four committed suicide; eleven were dethroned, and their subsequent fate is unknown. Not more than two-thirds of the Singhalese kings retained sovereign authority to their decease, or reached the funeral pile without a violent death.--FORBES' _Eleven Years in Ceylon_, vol. i. ch. iv. p. 80, 97; JOINVILLE, _Religion and Manners of the People of Ceylon; Asiat. Res._ vol. vii. p. 423. See also _Mahawanso_, ch. xxiii. p. 201.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 119.]

One source of royal contention arose on the death of Dutugaimunu; his son, having forfeited his birthright by an alliance with a wife of lower caste, was set aside from the succession; Saidaitissa, a brother of the deceased king, being raised to the throne in his stead. The priests, on the death of Saidaitissa, B.C. 119, hastened to proclaim his youngest son Thullatthanako[1], to the prejudice of his elder brother Laiminitissa, but the latter established his just claim by the sword, and hence arose two rival lines, which for centuries afterwards were prompt on every opportunity to advance adverse pretensions to the throne, and assert them by force of arms.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiii. p. 201.]

In such contests the priesthood brought a preponderant influence to whatever side they inclined [1]; and thus the royal authority, though not strictly sacerdotal, became so closely identified with the hierarchy, and so guided by its will, that each sovereign's attention was chiefly devoted to forwarding such measures as most conduced to the exaltation of Buddhism and the maintenance of its monasteries and temples.

[Footnote 1: It was the dying boast of Dutugaimunu that he had lived "a slave to the priesthood." The expression was figurative in his case; but so abject did the subserviency of the kings become, and so rapid was its growth, that Bhatiya Tissa, who reigned A.D. 8, rendered it literal, and "dedicated himself, his queen, and two sons, as well as his charger, and state elephant, as _slaves to the priesthood_." The _Mahawanso_ intimates that the priests themselves protested against this debasement, ch. xxxiv. p. 214.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 119.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

A signal effect of this regal policy, and of the growing diffusion of Buddhism, is to be traced in the impulse which it communicated to the reclamation of lands and the extension of cultivation. For more than three hundred years no mention is made in the Singhalese annals of any mode of maintaining the priesthood other than the royal distribution of clothing and voluntary offerings of food. They resorted for the "royal alms" either to the residence of the authorities or to halls specially built for their accommodation [1], to which they were summoned by "the shout of refection;" [2] the ordinary priests receiving rice, "those endowed with the gift of preaching, clarified butter, sugar, and honey."[3] Hospitals and medicines for their use, and rest houses on their journeys, were also provided at the public charge.[4] These expedients were available so long as the numbers of the priesthood were limited; but such were the multitudes who were tempted to withdraw from the world and its pursuits, in order to devote themselves to meditation and the diffusion of Buddhism, that the difficulty became practical of maintaining them by personal gifts, and the alternative suggested itself of setting apart lands for their support. This innovation was first resorted to during an interregnum. The Singhalese king Walagam Bahu, being expelled from his capital by a Malabar usurpation B.C. 104, was unable to continue the accustomed regal bounty to the priesthood; dedicated certain lands while in exile in Rohuna, for the support of a fraternity "who had sheltered him there."[5] The precedent thus established, was speedily seized upon and extended; lands were everywhere set apart for the repair of the sacred edifices[6], and eventually, about the beginning of the Christian era, the priesthood acquired such an increase of influence as sufficed to convert their precarious eleemosynary dependency into a permanent territorial endowment; and the practice became universal of conveying estates in mortmain on the construction of a wihara or the dedication of a temple.[7]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xx. p. 123; xxii. p. 132,135.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxviii. p. 167.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxii. p. 196-7.]

[Footnote 4: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxii. p. 196 xxxvii. p. 244; _Rajaratnacari_, p. 39, 41.]

[Footnote 5: _Mahawanso_, ch, xxxiii. p. 203. Previous to this date a king of Rohuna, during the usurpation of Elala, B.C. 205, had appropriated lands near Kalany, for the repairs of the dagoba.--_Rajaratnacari_, p. 37.]

[Footnote 6: In the reign of Batiya Tissa, B.C. 20. _Mahawanso_,, ch. xxxiv. p. 212; _Rajaratnacari_, p. 51.]

[Footnote 7: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. p. 214.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

The corporate character of the recipients served to neutralise the obligations by which they were severally bound; the vow of poverty, though compulsory on an individual priest, ceased to be binding on the community of which he was a member; and whilst, on his own behalf, he was constrained to abjure the possession of property, even to the extent of one superfluous cloth, the wihara to which he was attached, in addition to its ecclesiastical buildings, and its offerings in gems and gold, was held competent to become the proprietor of broad and fertile lands.[1] These were so bountifully bestowed by royal piety, by private munificence, and by mortuary gifts, that ere many centuries had elapsed the temples of Ceylon absorbed a large proportion of the landed property of the kingdom, and their possessions were not only exempted from taxation, but accompanied by a right to the compulsory labour of the temple tenants.[2]

[Footnote 1: HARDY'S _Eastern Monachism_, ch. viii. p. 68.]

[Footnote 2: The _Rajaratnacari_ mentions an instance, A.D. 62, of eight thousand rice fields bestowed in one grant; and similar munificence is recorded in numerous instances prior, to A.D. 204.--_Rajaratnacari_, p. 57, 59, 64, 74, 113, &c. _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxv. p. 223, 224; ch. xxxvi. p. 233.]

As the estates so made over to religious uses lay for the most part in waste districts, the quantity of land which was thus brought under cultivation necessarily involved large extensions of the means of irrigation. To supply these, reservoirs were formed on such a scale as to justify the term "consecrated lakes," by which they are described in the Singhalese annals.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Rajaratnacari_, ch. ii. p. 37; _Rajavali_, p. 237.]

Where the circumstances of the ground permitted, their formation was effected by drawing an embankment across the embouchure of a valley so as to arrest and retain the waters by which it was traversed, and so vast were the dimensions of some of these gigantic tanks that many yet in existence still cover an area of from fifteen to twenty miles in circumference. The ruins of that at Kalaweva, to the north-west of Dambool, show that its original circuit could not have been less than forty miles, its retaining bund being upwards of twelve miles long. The spill-water of stone, which remains to the present time, is "perhaps one of the most stupendous monuments of misapplied human labour in the island."[1]

[Footnote 1: TURNOUR, _Mahawanso_, p. 12. The tank of Kalaweva was formed by Dhatu Sena, A.D. 459.--_Mahawanso_, ch. xxxviii. p. 257.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

The number of these stupendous works, which were formed by the early sovereigns of Ceylon, almost exceeds credibility. Kings are named in the native annals, each of whom made from fifteen to thirty[1], together with canals and all the appurtenances for irrigation. Originally these vast undertakings were completed "for the benefit of the country," and "out of compassion for living creatures;"[2] but so early as the first century of the Christian era, the custom became prevalent of forming tanks with the pious intention of conferring the lands which they enriched on the church. Wide districts, rendered fertile by the interception of a river and the formation of suitable canals, were appropriated to the maintenance of the local priesthood[3]; a tank and the thousands of acres which it fertilised were sometimes assigned for the perpetual repairs of a dagoba[4], and the revenues of whole villages and their surrounding rice fields were devoted to the support of a single wihara.[5]

[Footnote 1: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 41, 45, 54, 55; King Saidaitissa B.C. 137, made "eighteen lakes" (_Rajavali_, p. 233). King Wasabha, who ascended the throne A.D. 62, "caused sixteen large lakes to be enclosed" (_Rajaratnacari_, p. 57). Detu Tissa, A.D. 253, excavated six (_Rajavali_, p. 237), and King Maha Sen, A.D. 275, seventeen (_Mahawanso_, ch, xxxviii. p. 236).]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch, xxxvii. p. 242.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. p. 210; xxxv. p. 221; xxxviii. p. 237, _Rajaratnacari_, ch. ii. p. 57, 59, 64, 69, 74.]

[Footnote 4: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxv. p. 215, 218, 223; ch. xxxvii. p. 234; _Rajaratnacari_, ch. ii. p. 51. TURNOUR'S _Epitome_, p. 21.]

[Footnote 5: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxv. p. 218, 221; _Rajaratnacari_, ch. ii. p. 51; _Rajaviai_, p. 241.]

So lavish were these endowments, that one king, who signalised his reign by such extravagances as laying a carpet seven miles in length, "in order that pilgrims might proceed with unsoiled feet all the way from the Kadambo river (the Malwatté oya) to the mountain Chetiyo (Mihintala)," awarded a priest who had presented him with a draught of water during the construction of a wihara, "land within the circumference of half a yoyana (eight miles) for the maintenance of the temple."[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv, p. 3.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

It was in this manner that the beautiful tank at Mineri, one of the most lovely of these artificial lakes, was enclosed by Maha Sen, A.D. 275; and, together with the 80,000 amonams of ground which it waters, was conferred on the Jeytawana Wihara which the king had just erected at Anarajapoora.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Rajaratnacari_, ch. ii. p. 69.]

To identify the crown still more closely with the interests of agriculture, some of the kings superintended public works for irrigating the lands of the temples[1]; and one more enthusiastic than the rest toiled in the rice fields to enhance the merit of conferring their produce on the priesthood.[2]

[Footnote 1: TURNOUR'S _Epitome_, p. 33.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. The Buddhist kings of Burmah are still accustomed to boast, almost in the terms of the _Mahawanso_, of the distinction which they have earned, by the multitudes of tanks they have constructed or restored. See YULE'S _Narrative of the Mission to Ava in 1855_, p. 106.]

These broad possessions, the church, under all vicissitudes and revolutions, has succeeded in retaining to the present day. Their territories, it is true, have been diminished in extent by national decay; the destruction of works for irrigation has converted into wilderness and jungle plains once teeming with fertility; and the mild policy of the British government, by abolishing _raja-kariya_[1], has emancipated the peasantry, who are no longer the serfs either of the temples or the chiefs. But in every district of the island the priests are in the enjoyment of the most fertile lands, over which the crown exercises no right of taxation; and such is the extent of their possessions that, although their precise limits have not been ascertained by the local government, they have been conjectured with probability to be equal to one-third of the cultivated land of the island.

[Footnote 1: Compulsory labour.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

One peculiarity in the Buddhist ceremonial served at all times to give a singular impulse to the progress of horticulture. Flowers and garlands are introduced in its religious rites to the utmost excess. The atmosphere of the wiharas and temples is rendered oppressive with the perfume of champac and jessamine, and the shrine of the deity, the pedestals of his image, and the steps leading to the temple are strewn thickly with blossoms of the nagaha and the lotus. At an earlier period the profusion in which these beautiful emblems were employed in sacred decorations appears almost incredible; the _Mahawanso_ relates that the Ruanwellé dagoba, which was 270 feet in height, was on one occasion "festooned with garlands from pedestal to pinnacle till it resembled one uniform bouquet;" and at another time, it and the lofty dagoba at Mihintala were buried under heaps of jessamine from the ground to the summit.[1] Fa Hian, in describing his visit to Anarajapoora in the fourth century, dwells with admiration and wonder on the perfumes and flowers lavished on their worship by the Singhalese[2]; and the native historians constantly allude as familiar incidents to the profusion in which they were employed on ordinary occasions, and to the formation by successive kings of innumerable gardens for the floral requirements of the temples. The capital was surrounded on all sides[3] by flower gardens, and these were multiplied so extensively that, according to the _Rajaratnacari_, one was to be found within a distance of four leagues in any part of Ceylon.[4] Amongst the regulations of the temple built at Dambedinia, in the thirteenth century, was "every day an offering of 100,000 flowers, and each day a different flower."[5]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv.; _Rajaratnacari_, p. 52, 53.]

[Footnote 2: FA HIAN. _Foè Kouè Ki_, ch. xxxviii. p. 335.]

[Footnote 3: _Rajavali_, p. 227; _Mahawanso_, ch. xi. p. 67.]

[Footnote 4: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 29, 49. Amongst the officers attached to the great establishments of the priests in Mihintala, A.D. 246, there are enumerated in an inscription engraven on a rock there, a secretary, a treasurer, a physician, a surgeon, a painter, twelve cooks, twelve thatchers, ten carpenters, six carters, and _two florists_.]

[Footnote 5: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 103. The same book states that another king, in the fifteenth century, "offered no less than 6,480,320 sweet smelling flowers" at the shrine of the Tooth.--_Ib._, p. 136.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

Another advantage conferred by Buddhism on the country was the planting of fruit trees and esculent vegetables for the gratuitous use of travellers in all the frequented parts of the island. The historical evidences of this are singularly corroborative of the genuineness of the Buddhist edicts engraved on various rocks and monuments in India, the deciphering of which was the grand achievement of Prinsep and his learned coadjutors. On the pillars of Delhi, Allahabad, and other places, and on the rocks of Girnar and Dhauli, there exist a number of Pali inscriptions purporting to be edicts of Asoca (the Dharmasoca of the _Mahawanso_), King of Magadha, in the third century before the Christian era, who, on his conversion to the religion of Buddha, commissioned Mahindo, his son, to undertake its establishment in Ceylon. In these edicts, which were promulgated in the vernacular dialect, the king endeavoured to impress both upon his subjects and allies, as well as those who, although aliens, were yet "united in the law" of Buddha, the divine precepts of their great teacher; prominent amongst which are the prohibition against taking animal life[1], and the injunction that, "everywhere wholesome vegetables, roots, and fruit trees shall be cultivated, and that on the roads wells shall be dug and trees planted for the enjoyment of men and animals." In apparent conformity with these edicts, one of the kings of Ceylon, Addagaimunu, A.D. 20, is stated in the _Mahawanso_ to have "caused to be planted throughout the island every description of fruit-bearing creepers, and interdicted the destruction of animal life,"[2] and similar acts of pious benevolence, performed by command of various other sovereigns, are adverted to on numerous occasions.

[Footnote 1: It is curious that one of these edicts of Asoca, who was contemporary with Devenipiatissa, is addressed to "all the conquered territories of the raja, even unto the ends of the earth; as in Chola, in Pida, in Keralaputra, _and in Tambapanni_ (or Ceylon)." This license of speech, reminding one of the grandiloquent epistles "from the Flaminian Gate," was no doubt assumed in virtue of the recent establishment of Buddhism, or, as it is called in the _Mahawanso_ "the religion of the Vanquisher," and Asoca, as its propagator, thus claims to address the converts as his "subjects."]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxv. p. 215. The king Upatissa, A.D. 368, in the midst of a solemn ceremonial, "observing ants, and other insects drowning in an inundation, halted, and having swept them towards the with the feathers of a peacock's tail, and enabled them to save a themselves, he continued the procession."--_Mahawanso_, ch. xxxvii p. 249; _Rajaratnacari_, p. 49, 52; _Rajavali_, p. 228.]

CHAP. VII

FATE OF THE ABORIGINES.

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

It has already been shown, that devotion and policy combined to accelerate the progress of social improvement in Ceylon, and that before the close of the third century of the Christian era, the island to the north of the Kandyan mountains contained numerous cities and villages, adorned with temples and dagobas, and seated in the midst of highly cultivated fields. The face of the country exhibited broad expanses of rice land, irrigated by artificial lakes, and canals of proportionate magnitude, by which the waters from the rivers, which would otherwise have flowed idly to the sea, were diverted inland in all directions to fertilise the rice fields of the interior.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxv. xxxvii.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

In the formation of these prodigious tanks, the labour chiefly employed was that of the aboriginal inhabitants, the Yakkhos and Nagas, directed by the science and skill of the conquerors. Their contributions of this kind, though in the instance of the Buddhist converts they may have been to some extent voluntary, were, in general, the result of compulsion.[1] Like the Israelites under the Egyptians, the aborigines were compelled to make bricks[2] for the stupendous dagobas erected by their masters[3]; and eight hundred years after the subjugation of the island, the _Rajavali_ describes vast reservoirs and appliances for irrigation, as being constructed by the forced labour of the Yakkhos[4] under the superintendence of Brahman engineers.[5] This, to some extent, accounts for the prodigious amount of labour bestowed on these structures; labour which the whole revenue of the kingdom would not have sufficed to purchase, had it not been otherwise procurable.

[Footnote 1: In some instances the soldiers of the king were employed in forming works of irrigation.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxviii.]

[Footnote 3: _Ibid_., ch. xxvii.]

[Footnote 4: _Rajavali_, p. 237, 238. Exceptions to the extortion of forced labour for public works took place under the more pious kings, who made a merit of paying the workmen employed in the erection of dagobas and other religious monuments.--_Mahawanso_, ch, xxxv.]

[Footnote 5: _Maharwanso_, ch. x.]

Under this system, the fate of the aborigines was that usually consequent on the subjugation of an inferior race by one more highly civilised. The process of their absorption into the dominant race was slow, and for centuries they continued to exist distinct, as a subjugated people. So firmly rooted amongst them was the worship both of demons and serpents, that, notwithstanding the ascendency of Buddhism, many centuries elapsed before it was ostensibly abandoned; from time to time, "demon offerings" were made from the royal treasury[1]; and one of the kings, in his enlarged liberality, ordered that for every ten villages there should be maintained an astrologer and a "devil-dancer," in addition to the doctor and the priest.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. x.; TURNOUR'S _Epitome_. p. 23.]

[Footnote 2: TURNOUR'S _Epitome_, p. 27; _Rajaratnacari_, ch. ii.; _Rajavali_, p. 241.]

Throughout the Singhalese chronicles, the notices of the aborigines are but casual, and occasionally contemptuous. Sometimes they allude to "slaves of the Yakkho tribe,"[1] and in recording the progress and completion of the tanks and other stupendous works, the _Mahawanso_ and the _Rajaratnacari_, in order to indicate the inferiority of the natives to their masters, speak of their conjoint labours as that of "men and snakes,"[2] and "men and demons."[3]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. x.]

[Footnote 2: Ibid., ch. xix, p. 115.]

[Footnote 3: The King Maha-Sen, anxious for the promotion of agriculture, caused many tanks to be made "by men and devils."--_Mahawanso_, ch. xxxvii.; UPHAM'S _Transl.; Rajaratnacari_, p. 69; _Rajavali_, p. 237.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

Notwithstanding the degradation of the natives, it was indispensable to "befriend the interests" of a race so numerous and so useful; hence, they were frequently employed in the military expeditions of the Wijayan sovereigns[1], and the earlier kings of that dynasty admitted the rank of the Yakkho chiefs who shared in these enterprises. They assigned a suburb of the capital for their residence[2], and on festive occasions they were seated on thrones of equal eminence with that of the king.[3] But every aspiration towards a recovery of their independence was checked by a device less characteristic of ingenuity in the ascendant race, than of simplicity combined with jealousy in the aborigines. The feeling was encouraged and matured into a conviction which prevailed to the latest period of the Singhalese sovereignty, that no individual of pure Singhalese extraction could be elevated to the supreme power, since no one could prostrate himself before one of his own nation.[4]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso,_ ch. x.]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid.,_ ch. x. p. 67.]

[Footnote 3: _Ibid.,_ p. 66.]

[Footnote 4: JOINVILLE'S _Asiat. Res,_ vol. vii. p. 422.]

For successive generations, however, the natives, although treated with partial kindness, were regarded as a separate race. Even the children of Wijayo, by his first wife Kuweni, united themselves with their maternal connexions on the repudiation of their mother by the king, "and retained the attributes of Yakkhos,"[1] and by that designation the natives continued to be distinguished down to the reign of Dutugaimunu.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso,_ ch. vii.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

In spite of every attempt at conciliation, the process of amalgamation between the two races was reluctant and slow. The earliest Bengal immigrants sought wives among the Tamils, on the opposite coast of India[1]; and although their descendants intermarried with the natives, the great mass of the population long held aloof from the invaders, and occasionally vented their impatience in rebellion.[2] Hence the progress of civilisation amongst them was but partial and slow, and in the narratives of the early rulers of the island there is ample evidence that the aborigines long retained their habits of shyness and timidity.

[Footnote 1: _Ibid.,_ p. 53.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch, lxxxv.]

Notwithstanding the frequent resort of every nation of antiquity to its coasts, the accounts of the first voyagers are almost wholly confined to descriptions of the loveliness of the country, the singular brilliancy of its jewels, the richness of its pearls, the sagacity of its elephants, and the delicacy and abundance of its spices; but the information which they furnish regarding its inhabitants is so uniformly meagre, as to attest the absence of intercourse; and the writers of all nations, Romans, Greeks, Arabians, Chinese and Indians, concur in their allusions to the unsocial and uncivilised customs of the islanders.[1]

[Footnote 1: See an account of these singular peculiarities, Vol. I. P. IV. c. vii.]

As the Bengal adventurers advanced into the interior of the island, a large section of the natives withdrew into the forests and hunting grounds on the eastern and southern coasts.[1] There, subsisting by the bow[2] and the chase, they adhered, with moody tenacity, to the rude habits of their race; and in the Veddah of the present day, there is still to be recognised a remnant of the untamed aborigines of Ceylon.[3]

[Footnote 1: _Hiouen Thsang,_ the Chinese geographer, who visited India in the seventh century, says that at that time the Yakkhos had retired to the south-east corner of Ceylon;--and here their descendants, the Veddahs, are found at the present day,--_Voyages,_ &c., liv. iv. p. 200.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso,_ ch. xxiv. p. 145, xxxiii. p. 204.]

[Footnote 3: DE ALWIS, _Sidath Sangara,_ p. xvii. For an account of the Veddahs and their present condition, see Vol. II. P. ix. ch. iii.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

Even those of the original race who slowly conformed to the religion and habits of their masters, were never entirely emancipated from the ascendency of their ancient superstitions. Traces of the worship of snakes and demons are to the present hour clearly perceptible amongst them; the Buddhists still resort to the incantations of the "devil dancers" in case of danger and emergency[1]; a Singhalese, rather than put a Cobra de Capello to death, encloses the reptile in a wicker cage, and sets it adrift on the nearest stream; and in the island of Nainativoe, to the south-west of Jaffa, there was till recently a little temple, dedicated to the goddess Naga Tambiran, in which consecrated serpents were tenderly reared by the Pandarams, and daily fed at the expense of the worshippers.[2]

[Footnote 1: For an account of Demon worship as it still exists in Ceylon, see Sir J. EMERSON TENNANT'S _History of Christianity in Ceylon,_ ch. v. p. 236.]

[Footnote 2: CASIE CHITTY'S _Gazetteer, &c.,_ p. 169.]

CHAP. VIII

EXTINCTION OF THE "GREAT DYNASTY."

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

From the death of Dutugaimunu to the exhaustion of the superior dynasty on the death of Malta-Sen, A.D. 301, there are few demonstrations of pious munificence to signalise the policy of the intervening sovereigns. The king whom, next to Devenipiatissa and Dutugaimunu, the Buddhist historians rejoice to exalt as one of the champions of the faith, was Walagam-bahu I.[1], whose reign, though marked by vicissitudes, was productive of lasting benefit to the national faith. Walagam-bahu ascended the throne B.C. 104., but was almost immediately forced to abdicate by an incursion of the Malabars; who, concerting a simultaneous landing at several parts of the island, combined their movements so successfully that they seized on Anarajapoora, and drove the king into concealment in the mountains near Adam's Peak; and whilst one portion of the invaders returned laden with plunder to the Dekkan, their companions remained behind and held undisputed possession of the northern parts of Ceylon for nearly fifteen years.

[Footnote 1: Called in the _Mahawanso_, "Wata-gamini".]

[Sidenote: B.C. 104.]

In this and the frequent incursions which followed, the Malabar leaders were attracted by the wealth of the country to the north of the Mahawelli-ganga; the southern portion of the island being either too wild and unproductive to present a temptation to conquest, or too steep and inaccessible to afford facilities for invasion. Besides, the highlanders who inhabit the lofty ranges that lie around Adam's Peak; (a district known as Malaya, "the region of mountains and torrents,")[1] then and at all times exhibited their superiority over the lowlanders in vigour, courage, and endurance. Hence the petty kingdoms of Maya and Rohuna afforded on every occasion a refuge to the royal family when driven from the northern capital, and furnished a force to assist in their return and restoration. Walagam-bahu, after many years' concealment there, was at last enabled to resume the offensive, and succeeded in driving out the infidels, and recovering possession of the sacred city, an event which he commemorated in the usual manner by the erection of dagobas, tanks, and wiharas.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. vii.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 89.]

But the achievement by which most of all he entitled himself to the gratitude of the Singhalese annalists, was the reduction to writing of the doctrines and discourses of Buddha, which had been orally delivered by Mahindo, and previously preserved by tradition alone. These sacred volumes, which may be termed the Buddhist Scriptures, contain the Pittakataya, and its commentaries the Atthakatha, and were compiled by a company of priests in a cave to the north of Matelle, known as the Aloo-wihara.[1] This, and other caverns in which the king had sought concealment during his adversity, he caused to be converted into rock temples after his restoration to power. Amongst the rest, Dambool, which is the most remarkable of the cave temples of Ceylon from its vastness, its elaborate ornaments, and the romantic beauty of its situation and the scenery surrounding it.

[Footnote 1: _Rajaratnacari_, ch. i. p. 43. Abouzeyd states that at that time public writers were employed in recording the traditions of the island: "Le Royaume de Serendyb a une loi et des docteurs qui s'assemblent de temps en temps comme se réunissent chez nous les personnes qui recreillent les traditions du prophète, et les Indiens se rendent auprès des docteurs, et écrivent sous leurs dictée, la vie de leurs prophètes et les préceptes de leur loi."--REINAUD, _Relation, &c.,_ tom. i. p. 127.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 62.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 50.]

The history of the Buddhist religion in Ceylon is not, however, a tale of uniform prosperity. The first of its domestic enemies was Naga, the grandson of the pious Walagam-bahu, whom the native, historians stigmatise by the prefix of "chora" or the "marauder." His story is thus briefly but emphatically told in the _Mahawanso_: "During the reign of his father Mahachula, Chora Naga wandered through the island leading the life of a robber; returning on the demise of the king he assumed the monarchy; and in the places which had denied him an asylum during his marauding career, he impiously destroyed the wiharas.[1] After a reign of twelve years he was poisoned by his queen Anula, and regenerated in the Lokantariko hell."[2]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiii.; _Rajarali_, p. 224; TURNOUR'S _Epitome_, p. 19; _Rajaratnacari_, ch. i. p. 43, 44.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. p. 209.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 47.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 41.]

His son, King Kuda Tissa, was also poisoned by his mother, in order to clear her own way to the throne. The Singhalese annals thus exhibit the unusual incident of a queen enrolled amongst the monarchs of the _great dynasty_--a precedent which was followed in after times; Queen Siwalli having reigned in the succeeding century, A.D. 37, Queen Lila-wati, in A.D. 1197, and Queen Kalyana-wati in A.D. 1202. From the excessive vileness of her character, the first of these Singhalese women who attained to the honours of sovereignty is denounced in the _Mahawanso_ as "the infamous Anula." In the enormity of her crimes and debauchery she was the Messalina of Ceylon;--she raised to the throne a porter of the palace with whom she cohabited, descending herself to the subordinate rank of Queen Consort, and poisoned him to promote a carpenter in his stead. A carrier of firewood, a Brahman, and numerous other paramours followed in rapid succession, and shared a similar fate, till the kingdom was at last relieved from the opprobrium by a son of Prince Tissa, who put the murderess to death, and restored the royal line in his own person. His successors for more than two centuries were a race of pious _fainéants_, undistinguished by any qualities, and remembered only by their fanatical subserviency to the priesthood.

[Sidenote: A.D. 209.]

Buddhism, relieved from the fury of impiety, was next imperilled by the danger of schism. Even before the funeral obsequies of Buddha, schism had displayed itself in Maghadha, and two centuries had not elapsed from his death till it had manifested itself on no less than seventeen occasions, and in each instance it was with difficulty checked by councils in which the priesthood settled the faith in relation to the points which gave rise to dispute; but not before the actual occurrence of secessions from the orthodox church.[1] The earliest differences were on questions of discipline amongst the colleges and fraternities at Anarajapoora; but in the reign of Wairatissa, A.D. 209, a formidable controversy arose, impugning the doctrines of Buddhism, and threatening for a time to rend in sunder the sacred unity of the church.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. v. p. 21.]

[Footnote 2: Ibid., ch. xxxiii.]

[Sidenote: A.D. 209.]

Buddhism, although, tolerant of heresy, has ever been vehement in its persecution of schism. Boldly confident in its own superiority, it bears without impatience the glaring errors of open antagonists, and seems to exult in the contiguity of competing systems as if deriving strength by comparison. In this respect it exhibits a similarity to the religion of Brahma, which regards with composure shades of doctrinal difference, and only rises into jealous energy in support of the distinctions of caste, an infringement of which might endanger the supremacy of the priesthood.[1] To the assaults of open opponents the Buddhist displays the calmest indifference, convinced that in its undiminished strength, his faith is firm and inexpugnable; his vigilance is only excited by the alarm of internal dissent, and all his passions are aroused to stifle the symptoms of schism.[2]

[Footnote 1: Hence the indomitable hatred with which the Brahmans pursued the disciples of Buddhism from the fourth century before Christ to its final expulsion from Hindustan. "Abundant proofs," says Turnour, "may be adduced to show the fanatical ferocity with which these two great sects persecuted each other; and which, subsided into passive hatred and contempt, only when the parties were no longer placed in the position of actual collision."--Introd. _Mahawanso_, p. xxii.]

[Footnote 2: In its earliest form Buddhism was equally averse to persecution, and the _Mahawanso_ extols the liberality of Asoca in giving alms indiscriminately to the members of all religions _(Mahawanso_, ch. v. p. 23). A sect which is addicted to persecution is not likely to speak approvingly of toleration, but the _Mahawanso_ records with evident satisfaction the courtesy paid to the sacred things of Buddhism by the believers in other doctrines; thus the Nagas did homage to the relics of Buddha and mourned their removal from Mount Meru (_Mahawanso_, ch. xxxi. p. 189); the Yakkhos assisted at the building of dagobas to enshrine them, and the Brahmans were the first to respect the Bo-tree on its arrival in Ceylon (_Ib._ ch. xix. p. 119). COSMAS INDICOPLEUSTES, whose informant, Sopater, visited Ceylon in the sixth century, records that there was then the most extended toleration, and that even the Nestorian Christians had perfect freedom and protection for their worship.

Among the Buddhists of Burmah, however, "although they are tolerant of the practice of other religions by those who profess them, secession from the national faith, is rigidly prohibited, and a convert to any other form of faith incurs the penalty of death."--Professor WILSON, _Journ. Roy. Asiat. Soc._ vol. xvi. p. 261.]

[Sidenote: A.D. 209.]

This characteristic of the "religion of the Vanquisher" is in strict conformity, not alone with the spirit of his doctrine, but also with the letter of the law laid down for the guidance of his disciples. Two of the singular rock-inscriptions of India deciphered by Prinsep, inculcate the duty of leaving the profession of different faiths unmolested; on the ground, that "all aim at moral restraint and purity of life, although all cannot be equally successful in attaining to it." The sentiments embodied in one of the edicts[1] of King Asoca are very striking: "A man must honour his own faith, without blaming that of his neighbour, and thus will but little that is wrong occur. There are even circumstances under which the faith of others should be honoured, and in acting thus a man increases his own faith and weakens that of others. He who acts differently, diminishes his own faith and injures that of another. Whoever he may be who honours his own faith and blames that of others out of devotion to his own, and says, 'let us make our faith conspicuous,' that man merely injures the faith he holds. Concord alone is to be desired."

[Footnote 1: The twelfth tablet, which, as translated by BURNOUF and Professor WILSON, will be found in Mrs. SPEIR'S _Life in Ancient India_,