Dedigama

The ancient Sinhalese chronicle, the Culavamasa tells us that the consort of Manabharana, the crown prince of Sri Lanka,

... bore a son at a moment marked by a lucky constellation. Clear at this moment were all the quarters of the heavens and cool, fragrant, gentle breezes blew. With the trumpeting of the elephants and the neighing of the horses the royal courtyard was filled with resounding din.

This heavenly event took place in a city known as Punkhagama, the capital of the principality of Dakkhinadesa, of which Manabharana was the sub-king (yuvaraja).

The child was named Parakramabahu (Parakkamabahu in Pali). Many years later, about 1153 AD he became king of the whole island as Parakramabahu I (the Great). He then constructed a shrine at the place of his birth, the Suthigara Cetiya (the Chaitya of the house of birth).

Interestingly, when Wilhelm Geiger (the father of Hans, the inventor of the Geiger Counter) was translating the Culawamsa, the location of Punkhagama had not yet been discovered. Geiger Snr tells us in a footnote that 'Parakkamabahu 1 erected a tope there 120 cubits high of which there ought still to be traces'.

Archaeological department board at the Kotavehera

This tope was identified later as the Kotavehera, in the modern village of Dedigama (pronounced tha-thee-gah-muh), and excavations were carried out there in the 1960s. So Punkhagama is most likely Dedigama. Apparently the place-name is derived from Jatigama, an alternative ancient name for the place.

The dagoba is the largest in the Wet Zone of Sri Lanka. Parakramabahu I was a great lover of monumental architecture and bigness generally. He made tanks in the Wet Zone (where they were not really necessary) in order to show off his prowess and in order to recreate the 'Milk Ocean' in a large-scale Mandala, a representation of the Indic Cosmos .

Obviously I am not a great fan of Parakramabahu's - his reputation was as much due to his panegyrist in the Culawamsa as anything he did; although it was possibly his unification of the Mahayana and Theravada Buddhist clergy in a single, state-controlled body which ensured for him a sympathetic press.

Sutighara cetiya from the north-east

Be that as it may, the dagoba is truly impressive. It is 78 metres (256 feet) in diameter and 14.3 metres (47 feet) high. I couldn't get the whole thing onto a single frame, so I had to do a stitch-up of two photos - a bit of a botch-up actually.

The size of the structure is illustrated by this photo of a senior citizen walking around it in the prescribed clock-wise manner. Note the multi-coloured branches of Na (Ironwood) trees in the foreground and the concentric perimeter rings (pesa walalu) at the base of the stupa.

Elderly man circling the dagoba

Not withstanding the size of the dagoba, it is referred to as the Kotavehera (short stupa) , not because of any deficiency in its height, but because it was built without the usual upper structure, the traditional cube-shaped enclosure (hatharæs kotuwa) and pinnacle (koth kærælla). Rather like calling a tall person short because they do not wear a hat.

On the eastern side of the dagoba, just above the second of the pesa walalu at the foot of the dagoba, is a smaller stupa, about 11 metres (36 feet) in diameter. It is said to mark the exact place of Parakramabahu's birth. It is that little pimple on the side of the dagoba, in my stitch-up shot above. The photo below shows it in close-up:

Smaller dagoba

The larger dagoba appears to have been anchored on the lesser. Here is an even closer shot:

Smaller dagoba

Excavations found a koraha (a pot for washing rice in) beneath the smaller dagoba. Not surprisingly, however, it was the larger which yielded the greater treasure. The main reliquary chamber, guarded by multi-headed cobras (like the one at Oorusitano tank), was complemented by 8 others arranged geometrically around it. The artefacts found there were housed in a museum built close by.

The way to the archaeological museum

A break-in occurred there not too many years ago, and the thieves got away with a large number of artefacts, especially some exquisite Buddha statues covered in gold foil. However, less monetarily valuable but priceless historically, the main prize of the collection was left behind. This was the elephant lamp.

Elephant lamp

This elegant oil lamp is one of a pair taken from the heart of the dagoba - the other being at the Colombo Museum. The identical lamps are of the hanging type and each consists an oil receptacle surmounted by an elephant and its mahout. The whole is suspended by the apex of a torana above the elephant, which is affixed to a chain.

Detailed drawing of elephant lamp

The elephant figure stands in the middle of the oil receptacle, which can be filled with oil. There is also a reservoir for the oil in the elephant's belly (marked in white on black in the central figure above). Oil is poured in using the hollow of one of the forelegs as a funnel.

After the lamp is lit, the level of oil in the receptacle goes down. When it goes below the level of the hole in the funnel-foreleg, an ingenious hydrostatic arrangement makes the pachyderm 'urinate' oil until the level of oil returns above the beast's feet. Obviously, the creator of this marvel of physics was something of a piss-artist.

Despite the burglary, many valuable artefacts remain in the museum, not just from Dedigama but from archaeological sites in the Kegalle area generally, including some interesting inscriptions. There is also a representation of the nine reliquary chambers of the Kotavehera, showing what was found where, and photographs of the dig.

You can get to Dedigama by turning to the right off the Colombo-Kandy road at Nelundeniya and driving about 3 kilometres (2 miles).

Dedigama is within easy driving distance of the rest houses at Ambepussa, Hanwella and Kitulgala, as well as the Ambalama hotel in Hanwella.

Tusk, Tusker, Rogue Elephant & Jumbo

In my earlier post on the Kombuwa, I referred to an elephant's tusks. Alas, at the time I had no image available and had to resort to plagiarising from a 17th century woodcut. Well, I had the good luck this morning to come across a really good-looking pair of tusks on a really magnificent-looking pachyderm.

Tusker, Hokandara Rd, Thalawathugoda

This chap was probably returning home after taking part in a perahera, a religious procession. Note the chains around his neck in the picture below:

Tusker, Thalawathugoda

'Tusker' can refer to any animal with tusks, eg. a wild boar. However, in the Sri Lankan context, 'tuskers' are, invariably, elephants. Henry Charles Sirr (Ceylon and the Cingalese, William Shorberl, London 1850) referred to them as 'tusk-elephants'. It was left to Sir James Emerson Tennent (Ceylon: an Account of the Island, Physical, Historical - Longman, Green, Longman, and Roberts, London 1859) to use the term 'tusker' for the first time (cf. Oxford English Dictionary).

Incidently, the OED credits Tennant with introducing 'Rogue Elephant' into the English language. However, it appears to have been Sirr (op cit) who did so:

It is well known these animals are usually found in herds, and when a solitary elephant is seen, the Cingalese say that it is a rogue-elephant, "hora alia", who has been expelled for nefarious and turbulent conduct by the other members of the herd.

In the Sinhala tongue, an elephant is an aliya (plural ali). A tusker, on the other hand, is called an æthaa, from the Prakrit hatthi (cf. Hindi hasthi) - 'elephant'. Now, the English 'Elephant' came (via Latin and French) from the Greek 'elephantos' or 'elephas' which, in turn probably came from the Phoenician 'elu' (the same as the Hamitic), although it might have originated from the Sanskrit ibhah. One wonders whether the Sinhala 'aliya' came from the same root as the Phoenician/Hamitic.

The earliest known examples of the Brahmi alphabet, as I mentioned in regard to the Kombuwa, are on potsherds, dating from the 6th century BC, found at Anuradhapura in Sri Lanka and at Kodumanal in South India. It is possible that it was a form of Phoenician, transplanted by traders. Compare the Brahmi and Phoenician alphabets.

Phoenicians bring treasure to King Solomon (Thanks to Karen Hatzigergiou)

The Phoenicians, along with the ships of Tarshish were hired by King Solomon (he of the mines) to bring his hardware and day-to-day groceries:

And the navy also of Hiram, that brought gold from Ophir, brought in from Ophir great plenty of almug trees, and precious stones. (1 Kings 10:11)

For the king had at sea a navy of Tharshish with the navy of Hiram: once in three years came the navy of Tharshish, bringing gold, and silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks. (1 Kings 10:22)

It may be postulated that the Phoenicians and the Tarshishites were both familiar with India and hence Sri Lanka.

Interestingly, although Phoenician was a Semitic language, the general Semitic term for 'elephant' is pil (Arabic and Persian fil). A sub-species of the Asian elephant survived in Mesopotamia until the 9th century BC, when seems to have been exterminated by overhunting. So the Semitic people had their own word for the jumbo.

Now Jumbo, as most people will know, was the name given to a famous 19th Century elephant which died. Being about 4 metres ( 12 feet) high at the shoulder, it posthumously lent its moniker to large things, from the Jumbo Jet to the oxymoronic but mouth-watering Jumbo Shrimp , via an entire range of jumbo orchids, from the Jumbo Ego to the Jumbo Pip.

The dead Jumbo was stuffed and exhibited at Tufts University, an institution of higher learning in Medford, Massachusetts. Alas, the taxidermised mastodon was destroyed in a fire, but that never loosened the affectionate ties that ivory tower had with the tusker. In its hallowed memory, the Tufts University Science Library has created a database known as 'Tufts University Sciences Knowledgebase' or TUSK.

Jumbo the statue

Another Jumbo, this time a diminutive statue of an elephant from an amusement park, adorns the campus. By comparison with the person of average height standing next to it, it is obvious that it cannot be above 3 metres at the shoulder. On the other hand, compare the height of the tusker I saw with that of its Mahout:

Tusker with Mahout, Thalawathugoda

About equal to the original Jumbo I should think. Its tusks may be seen in all their splendour in this photograph, but they are dwarfed by the ivory on Millangoda Raja, an Elephant with really long tusks (allegedly the longest in Asia).

More on the Kombuwa

My most illustrious and venerable older sister has given me greater insight into that magical-looking musical instrument, the Kombuwa. The term Kombuwa, originally a Tamil word, also stands for the non-initial letter 'E' in the Sinhala script.

Kombuwa, the Sinhala non-initial 'E'

My copy of Jayalalitha Swami's Tamil-English dictionary advises me that a kombu is the horn of an animal, a wind instrument, a branch of a tree, a shoot of ginger, an elephant's tusk, a pole of a palankeen, a symbol for the vowel 'e', or an opening in the side of a tank through which the water flows in or out.

The pro-Separatist website Tamilnet tells me (in relation to the place name Kompansaintakulam) that Kompu is in Tamil, a branch, a horn of an animal, a musical horn, a tusk; and in Malayalam, a Horn, a tusk, a musical horn, a branch, a pole, a mast, a spear. (P and B are both represented by a single letter in Tamil, hence the two different spellings).

Tamilnet also tells me that the Sinhala kombuwa is a musical instrument shaped like a French horn. However, neither the modern Sinhalese instrument nor the Tamil one look like a French horn. Another website gives more pictures of a Sinhalese kombuwa, for comparison.

The Malayalam (Keralite) one, on the other hand, does look more like a French horn. It also resembles the Sinhala non-initial 'e' letter.

Kerala kombus (Wikipedia)

The Tamil letter for the non-initial 'e' looks like this (and the Malayali is similar):

The non-initial 'e' letter in Tamil

Sinhala, Tamil and Malayali are all written in scripts derived from Brahmi. The earliest known examples of the script are on potsherds, dating from the 6th century BC, found at Anuradhapura in Sri Lanka and at Kodumanal in South India.

Hence it is likely that the terms for the letter all originated from a word which meant either 'branch' or 'horn' in a Dravidian or pre-dravidian tongue.

The tusks of an elephant looked like this to a 17th century English illustrator (please try and ignore the man being crushed by the elephant):

Elephant in Knox's Historical Relation

This is a fairly accurate representation, and it bears a strong resemblance to the South-east Indian kompu.

The Sinhalese kombuwa looks more like a French horn which has been untwisted and made straight in a less-than-perfect manner:

Mahanaga school bandleader with a kombuwa

On the road to Mahagama

Map of the hinterland of Hambantota, showing Mahagama

On the weekend I went to Mahagama, close to Sevenagala. This Mahagama was one of several ancient towns of that name, which were capitals of the southern Sri Lankan principality of Rohana (modern Ruhuna). This particular village is said to be the capital of Mahanaga, the brother of king Devanampiya Tissa, who fled Anuradhapura and established his own kingdom in the south.

To get to Mahagama we turned left (eastwards) just before Embilipitiya and drove along the dam (the bund) of the Udawalawe tank (reservoir) .

Bund of Udawalawe reservoir

The Udawalawe tank was created by damming the upper reaches of the Walawe river in order to provide water for the farmers of lower Sabaragamuwa and Ruhuna. The main road to the Udawalawe elephant sanctuary and beyond lies on top of the bund.

Approaching the Udawalawe sanctuary, we pass European tourists who have hired Land Rovers and are out for a good day of elephant spotting - Udawalawe is one of the best places for seeing Sri Lankan elephants (elaphas maximus).

European tourists

Udawalawe sanctuary is marked by an electified barbed wire fence. Some elephants gather along the fence to get goodies from visitors, like this one:

Elephant, Udawalawe reserve

Some years ago, one of these elephants had managed to cross the fence and had ravaged the nearby houses. However, the villagers told us that they have not had any problems recently.

The elections to the Uva Provincial Council were due on 8th August, so the campaign was in full swing. Opposite where I took the picture of the elephant was an 'election office' of the ruling United People's Freedom Alliance, festooned with posters of candidates. Moneragala is a classic centre-left district, so UPFA posters were much more in evidence than that of the other parties.

UPFA 'election office'

A TV programme featuring Shasheendra Rajapaksa, one of the prospective UPFA candidates for the Moneragala district of the Uva province (13 is his lucky number!) was due to be videotaped at the Mahanaga school at Mahagama. I found the school band ready to welcome the guests, who were late; the band was restive.

Mahanaga school band

The band, who were dressed in saris, had an interesting mix of western and oriental instruments. The leader, on the right of the photograph, carried a curvy horn known as a kombuwa.