Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and Topographical with Notices of Its Natural History Part 68

[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."--_Geographie, &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 inst.i.tutions 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 munic.i.p.alities 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. x.x.xiv.]

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 pa.s.sage 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 s.h.i.+ps 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 ca.n.a.ls. 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 Anaraj.a.poora, 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, Anaraj.a.poora.--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 ca.n.a.ls,[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. x.x.xiv. p. 211 (B.C. 20), ch. x.x.xv. p. 215 (A.D. 20). _Rajaratnacari_, ch. ii. p. 29.

_Rajavali_, p. 185, 227.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. x.x.xiv. p. 210 (B.C. 42), ch. x.x.xv. p. 221, 222 (A.D. 275), ch. x.x.xvii. 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 wors.h.i.+pper.[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 wors.h.i.+ppers 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 wors.h.i.+ppers 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, x.x.xiii, 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 establis.h.i.+ng the national faith of Ceylon, the sacred writers honour his name with the prefix of _Dewanan-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 aerial flight, and his descent on Ambatthalo, the loftiest peak of Mihintala, the mountain which, rising suddenly from the plain, overlooks the sacred city of Anaraj.a.poora. 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, a.s.suming 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 sanct.i.ty, 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 wors.h.i.+p. 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 wors.h.i.+p.[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, a.s.sociated 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 a.s.sumed by the first recorded Buddha; others had the iron-tree, the champac, the nipa, &c.--_Mahawanso_, TURNOUR'S Introd. p. x.x.xii.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 289.]