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Sri
Lanka is a well known destination to tourists for
its the fascinating cultural tourism attractions of
ancient cities and world heritage sites. The
magnificent, centuries old historical ruins and
monuments of the ancient cities in the island
interior reveal the advanced culture of ancient
civilizations of Sri Lanka.
Sri
Lanka is one of those places where history seems to
fade into the mist of legend. Is not Adam’s Peak
said to be the very place where Adam set foot on
earth, having been sent out of heaven? Isn’t that
his footprint squarely on top of the mountain to
prove it? Or is it the Buddha’s footprint on Sri
Pada? And isn’t Adam’s Bridge (the chain of islands
linking Sri Lanka to India) the very series of
stepping stones Rama, aided by his faithful ally,
the monkey god Hanuman, stepped across in his
mission to rescue Sita from the clutches of the
Rawana,King of Lanka, in the epic Ramayana?
The first entries in
the Mahavamsa – or “Great History” – date back to
543BC, which coincides with the arrival of Prince
Vijaya in Sri Lanka. Some 300 years later, commenced
the early Anuradhapura Period, with King Devanampiya
Tissa as the first ruler. It was in this period that
a sapling of the sacred Bo Tree, under which the
Lord Buddha attained enlightenment, was brought to
Sri Lanka. The late Anuradhapura Period, which began
in the year 459, saw the reign of King Kasyapa, and
the construction of Sigiriya. The Polonnaruwa
period, witnessed the transfer of the capital from
Anuradhapura to Polonnaruwa in 1073. Famed explorer,
Marco Polo, arrived in Sri Lanka in the period
between 1254 and 1324, and, in 1505, the Portuguese
landed, and occupied the island’s coastal regions.
The Portuguese
Period
At this time Sri Lanka had three main kingdoms – the
Kingdom of Jaffna in the north, the Kingdom of Kandy
in the central highlands and Kotte, the most
powerful, in the south-west. In 1505 the Portuguese,
under Lorennco de Almeida established friendly
relations with the king of Kotte and gained, for
Portugal, a monopoly in the spice and cinnamon
trade, which soon became of enormous importance in
Europe. Attempts by Kotte to utilize the strength
and protection of the Portuguese only resulted in
Portugal taking over and ruling not only their
regions, but the rest of the island, apart form the
central highlands around Kandy. Because the
highlands were remote and inaccessible, the kings of
Kandy were always able to defeat the attempts by the
Portuguese to annex them, and on a number of
occasions drove the Portuguese right back down to
the coast.
The Dutch Period
Attempts by Kandy to
enlist Dutch help in expelling the Portuguese only
resulted in the substitution of one European power
for another. By 1658, 153 years after the first
Portuguese contact, the Dutch took control over the
costal areas of the Island. During their
140-year-rule the Dutch, like Portuguese, were
involved in repeated unsuccessful attempts to bring
Kandy under their control. The Dutch were much more
interested in trade and profits than the Portuguese,
who spent a lot of efforts spreading their religion
and extending their physical control.
The British Period
The French revolution resulted in a major shake-up
among the European powers and in 1796 the Dutch were
easily supplanted by the British, who in 1815 also
won the control of the kingdom of Kandy, becoming
the first European power to rule the whole island.
But in 1802, Sri Lanka became a Crown Colony and in
1818 a unified administration for the island was set
up. Soon the country was dotted with coffee,
cinnamon and coconut plantations and a network of
roads and railways were built to handle this new
economic activity. English became the official
language, and is still widely spoken. Coffee was the
main crop and the backbone of the colonial economy,
but the occurrence of a leaf blight virtually wiped
it out in the 1870s and the plantations quickly
switched over to tea or rubber. Today Sri Lanka is
the world’s second largest tea exporter. The British
were unable to persuade the Sinhalese to work
cheaply and willingly on the plantations, so they
imported large number of South Indian labourers from
South India. Sinhalese peasants in the hill country
lost land to the estates.
With its own
traditional and cultural values dating back to
before BC, and the cultural values brought in by the
European rulers, Sri Lanka has plenty to provide for
those culturally interested tourist who want to
explore this wonderful Island... |
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