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- Sri Lanka’s Founding Vijayan Kings Part 2 | Dancing on Knives How did Sri Lanka, barely 7 decades old, survive the death of its founding father, Vijaya, and its first recorded civil war, which erupted over the death of Vijaya’s nephew? “If I want a crown,” remarked Peachey, hero of Kipling’s Man Who Would Be King, and unexpected alter ego of Prince Vijiya, Sri Lanka’s first monarch, “I must go and hunt it for myself.” If Peachey’s motivation was glory and riches, plain and straightforward, Vijaya’s was about raw survival, dodging assassinations and evading parental disapproval. If that is the case, the chronicles are to be believed. And in this, Sri Lanka is exceedingly fortunate, for it has not one but three great chronicles, claiming, between them, the title of the world’s oldest and longest historical narrative. Although these turbulent chronicles muddle man, god, and magic with morality, history, and myth, they also lay a wraithlike trail of events and people through what would otherwise be a historical vacuum, dotted with random, unattributed artefacts. Prince Vijaya’s existence is known only through the first two chronicles - The Dipavaṃsa Chronicle (compiled around the third to fourth centuries CE) and The Mahavaṃsa, The Great Chronicle, an epic poem written by a Buddhist monk in the fifth century CE in the ancient Pali script. These stupefying works, which put most soap operas and not a few Sci-Fi films to shame, open with Prince Vijaya’s arrival from Sinhapura, a legendary lost state in eastern India, and end in 302 CE. At this point, they hand the task of storytelling to the third and last book, the Culavamsa or Lesser Chronicle, which covers events to 1825, an otherwise blameless year the world over, with little more of note than the date of the first performance of Rossini's Barber of Seville. But if love and eternal fidelity are rarely the subject of the three chronicles, gold, betrayal, and secrecy often are – though historians naturally debate the factual accuracy of the stories, in which the doings of men and kings take a poor second place to those of monks and Lord Buddha. Even when the focus shifts from the divine to the secular, it is abundantly clear that, as with the most tenacious tales, history is inevitably written by the winners. Although verified archaeological evidence is still scarce, documentary evidence for Prince Vijaya remains tantalisingly absent; he remains, from every perspective, the great winner, the shaved-head fugitive with a penchant for what The Mahavamsa calls “evil conduct and … intolerable deeds,” every bit the rebranded hero. Expelled by his appalled father, thrust onto a ship with seven hundred dependent followers and ordered to stay away on pain of death, Prince Vijaya has, through the centuries, still managed to take centre stage as Sri Lanka’s paterfamilias. Centuries later, over a shared arak and soda, and, courtesy of reincarnation, it is more than likely that the reformed villain would tell you that he finds his righteous reputation puzzling. After all, he never set out to be a hero, still less founder of a nation; and quite possibly not even a king, claiming, in his own lifetime, the much more modest title of Prince. Survival, a bit of fun, respect, of course, obedient followers, amenable wives, good food and the space to be his own boss was probably as much as he aspired to. Indeed, so careless was he of his greater future that he almost destroyed his own fledgling dynasty just as it was starting, a nasty proclivity that was to recur just two generations later when his descendants tried to wipe themselves out. Twice, in under two hundred years, the Vijayans, the dynasty that was to make Sri Lanka the world’s only Singhala nation, came perilously close to obliterating it. It was the sort of carelessness typical of rulers bereft of the value of hindsight, operating like sword dancers twirling atop lofty stupas, and utterly reckless with their unfathomable dynastic destiny. It is said that Prince Vijaya sneaked into the country via the secret Puttalam Lagoon. If so, he enjoyed the value of surprise for the shortest of times. The Mahavamsa, whose respect for divinity of any sort is beyond reproach, has Lord Buddha task an acquiescent Hindu god with protecting the prince and reassuring him that the island he has alighted upon is pretty much empty. “There are no men here, and here no dangers will arise,” claims the god, helpfully disguised as a wandering ascetic. If one is to found a future nation, this sort of starting point is enormously helpful. Thousands of years later, so little is known about the fundamental social and political structures that existed on the island at this time that this myth of a largely empty island merely waiting for a noble race to occupy it is more than validated by ignorance. But lines are there to be read through, and The Mahavamsa wears the cognitive dissonance of its gilded lines with confident ease. Almost from the start, they imply, the prince and his followers found themselves fighting for survival, dominance, and land. The many conflicting stories surrounding his fights with man-eating wives, flying horses, skirmishes with indigenous tribes, protection under Buddha, and his willingness to swap his local wife, Kuveni, for a more glamorous and aristocratic Indian princess are, in fact, key parts of the country’s cherished creation myths. And curses too. For Kuveni, rejected, outcast and pushed to a shocking suicide, was to place such a curse on the king and his house as to taint “not only Vijaya but the descendants of Hela People (Singhala) as a whole,” wrote an observer. It has,” remarked another mournful raconteur, “overflowed to every nook and corner of Sri Lanka and enwrapped her people over the centuries.” If the nation delights in the stories about Vijaya, those about Kuveni, a native queen of the local Yaksha tribe, cause much head-shaking. For Kuveni was not simply a wife and weaver of cloth, a mother, lover, and queen - but also a demon, a metamorphoser, an outcast, an avenging fury, suicide, traitor, murderess, ghost, and mistress of deception. A descendant of the gods, she is also a goddess to the country’s still-living Aboriginal peoples. We may be forest haunters,” said a Vedda leader recently, “but Kuveni, our goddess.” Small wonder then that Sri Lanka, in not knowing what to really make of the Mother of the Nation, chooses to push her deep into one of its many locked closets. The slimmest of ancient – almost folkloric - hints mark the Prince’s landing on Sri Lanka’s shores Pulling his boats onto a beach of reddish-brown sand – “Tamba” meaning Copper, or as it was later known, Tambapanni- was the perfect spot for a settlement, commanding the access to an excellent natural harbour opening into the Gulf of Mannar and an almost inexhaustible supply of pearl oysters. “Horse Mountain” is another name for Kudiramalai, and for centuries, amidst the ruins of an ancient temple, a massive horse-and-man statue stood on the cliffs. Made of brick, stone, and coral, it is estimated to have been at least 35 feet high, its front legs raised, its rider clinging to reins, bearing a lantern to guide ships into the port. Locals still point to some modest ruins, all that remains, they say, of the horse and rider. And continually, raked by high waves and surf, broken bricks, pottery, and building materials wash up on the shore. Inland are a further set of ruins – mere pillars standing or fallen in the jungle and known locally as Kuveni’s Palace. Here, where history is forever unprovable, the historian can either move swiftly on to the following footnote or succumb to the impossible romance of possibility. Succumbing is naturally the better bet; certainly the most entertaining one. Although the Mahavaṃsa Chronicle portrays Prince Vijaya as the first and only Indian colonist to arrive in early Sri Lanka, it is more than likely that he was but one (albeit the most successful one) of several immigrants. Colonising the island from the north and west, moving inland along the banks of the Malvata Oya, other settlers undoubtedly arrived on the east coast and followed the Mahaweli River inland. Still others would have landed in the south, following other rivers inland to make settlements within Ruhana. The Vijayan progress would have forced the preexisting tribes - the Rakkhaka, Yakkha, Naga and Deva - to retreat inland and accept a new status imposed on them by these migrants from the subcontinent, who brought with them a steely view on caste. Most of the main Sinhalese castes derive in some form or another from here. The Brahman bedecked the very top, below which would have been the Govigama (from govi – literally “housekeeper”); Kavikara (dancers); Batgama (labourers); Radava (dhobis); Berava (drummers and folk priests); Oli (astrologers); Panikki (barbers); Yamannu (iron workers); and the lowest caste of all – the Rodi (untouchable). Fighting done, Prince Vijiya is said to have then founded the Kingdom of Tambapaṇṇi, situated in the northeast around Mannar and Puttalam. Nothing is known of how he spent his 38-year reign, except that he appears to have encouraged his lieutenants to set up allied settlements themselves, all of which would have retained some respectful subservience to Tambapanni. All we have left of these places are their possible names: Upatissagama, Ujjeni, Uruvela, Vijita, floating erratically on maps of the island's northeast, ephemeral as clouds in a blue tropical sky. Unusually for a king of Sri Lanka, Vijiya died naturally in 505 BCE. His achievements made up for his earlier criminal delinquency, with the Mahavaṃsa commenting, with immeasurable satisfaction, that he had “forsaken his former evil way of life,” and ruled “over all Lanka in peace and righteousness”. In this, the Chronicle is being more than kind. It is being disingenuous to say that, as he did, Viyaja inflicted on his family, kingdom, and reputation the one crime that no king can ever really be forgiven for: he died childless, or at least without any respectable and credible heir lined up to fill his shoes. That Sri Lanka’s future should hang on so avoidable a problem as this seems hardly believable – but then Vijaya had no idea, gasping his last few breaths, that he was about to leave behind a dynasty that ran (ignoring regnal interruptions) for over 600 years, putting it comfortably ahead of Mings and Moguls, Valois, Bourbons, Hohenzollerns, Tudors, Stuarts, or Aztecs. Or a country that, in the decisions it made and habits it formed around religion, language, writing, water, architecture, or civil administration (to name but a few), was to be like no other the world over, nor last 2,567 years, and still counting. Had he known this, he might have put a bit more effort into procreation. Still, instead, with an opportunism that was, after all, something of a personal hallmark, he left his problems at the feet of others, busying himself instead with the more urgent prerequisites of reincarnation. Astonishingly, it is better than a one-in-two bet that his tomb still exists. It is said to be located on Medagama Hill in Paduwasnuwara, halfway between Kurunegala and Puttalam. Indeed, the unmissable shape of a very ancient stupa is visible. And astonishingly too, ashes found in its heart during conservation work were tested by the Archaeological Department of Sri Lanka and found to be at least 2,500 – 2,600 years old, placing them well within touching distance of his death in 505 BCE. That the kingdom did not at this point merely implode is little short of miraculous. But then the Vijayans were ever the lucky dynasty – perhaps the most fortunate of the lot, and the prince’s long-time follower and chief advisor, Upatissa, took over, appearing unexpectedly content with the role of Caretaker King. Upatissa seems to have had his own little statelet nearby - Upatissa Nuwara; and may well have realised, with a wisdom that later kings would look on as ridiculously old-fashioned, that more (land, palaces, titles, concubines, curries, white horses, silk sarongs) is not always best. For a year, it seems he kept the throne warm whilst word was sent to Panduvasdeva, Vijayan’s nephew in India, that the job was now his. The new king, Panduvasdeva, was to arrive in his new kingdom at the port of Gokanna, present-day Trincomalee. The port was nearly 200 kilometres away from where Vijaya is said to have had his kingdom, indicating perhaps that the little kingdom had been expert in soaking up other people’s territory. The new king excelled in his fecund duties by producing ten sons and one daughter, a royal litter that more than made up for his uncle’s derisory efforts, prompting The Mahavamsa to note, with understandable smugness, that “the monarch lived happily.” Ruling for 30 years from 504 BCE, Panduvasdeva was just what the nascent dynasty needed to entrench itself. His most outstanding achievements - ruling for decades and producing heirs, albeit ones fixated on familicide – were more than enough to secure his golden reputation. But he was also to move his capital to the fortress of Vijithapura, close to what would later become the significant capital, Anuradhapura. And undoubtedly, like his uncle before him, he would have brought Indian craftsmen, technocrats, and experts in a variety of practical fields to help him develop and improve his state, a reverse brain drain of the sort that Sri Lanka, with 13% of its population now living and working abroad, would now welcome. Panduvasdeva's shortcomings were mainly in the parenting department. Fertile he may have been, but a role model or instiller of blameless family morals, he most certainly was not. Despite his bountiful prodigy, Panduvasdeva is chiefly remembered for the chaos that later enveloped the country, as his sons battled the morbid predictions of a court soothsayer who foretold that they would all be killed by their nephew, Pandu Kabhaya, son of their only sister, Princess Citta. That the royal nursery best resembles a pit of serpents was ever to be a hallmark of royal Sri Lanka. Still, in this case, it was quite possibly aggravated by the fact that Panduvasdeva’s offspring probably derived from a variety of (competing) wives. The harem was a key institution of the royal court, and a magnet for intrigue and politics until the last king of the previous kingdom breathed his last. Egged on by the Chronicles, at their dread and gossiping best, Panduvasudeva’s death was said to have been promoted by a terrible and wholly incurable disease that could be traced back all the way to the curse Kuveni placed on the Vijayan clan. This king’s death in 474 BCE heralded the second and much more serious existential threat to the dynasty’s future. But at this great distance from the events of the time, and with almost nothing to rely on in the historical record, counting leaves in a gale is likely to offer a greater degree of exactitude as to what really went on. At first, affairs seemed to move with reassuring predictability. Abhaya, Panduvasdeva’s eldest son, succeeded his father, reigning for 20 years before abruptly stepping down in 454 BCE in favour of his brother, Tissa. This was no joyful abdication, but a renunciation forced on him by his nine brothers, who accused him of plotting to ensure his nephew, Pandu Kabhaya, succeeded him. Spared his life, Abhaya retreated into a wise obscurity, sensibly declining his nephew’s later offer to retake the crown, settling instead for the far less pressured job of running Anuradhapura. Tissa, Abhaya’s immediate replacement, was a haunted man. Chief amongst his brothers, he was eager to head off the sinister predictions of the court soothsayer. But it was not to be. An ultimately unsuccessful balancing act characterised his rule: feuding with his brothers (many of whom died in the troubles) whilst keeping his nephew, Pandu Kabhaya, at bay. As civil war rocked the new nation for well over ten years, Tissa’s repeated attempts to find and slay Pandu Kabhaya were all foiled, and his reign (454 BCE – 437 BCE) came to a predictable end when Pandu Kabhaya killed him in battle. Like London buses, problems, it is said, always come in threes; but Vijayan Sri Lanka was blessed: they only came in twos. One more, and the lights would surely have all gone out. But they didn’t. The tricky years of the country’s most formative dynasty were over. It has survived – just. What was to come next were to be quite possibly the best years of the island’s life. Period. _________________________________________________________________________________________ That was a production written and recorded by David Swarbirck at The Ceylon Press, based in the jungle north of Kandy, at The Flame Tree Estate & Hotel, and designed to tell the story of Sri Lanka.