1. Deraniyagala, The Pre-history of Sri Lanka, Vol. I, p. 167.
2. Kulke and Rothermund, A History of India; Burton Stein, A History of India.
3. Weerakkody, Taprobanê.
4. On the geography of the island, see Peiris G.H., Development and Change in Sri Lanka.
5. The Dīpavamsa is a fourth-century work and the Mah•vaṁsa a sixth-century compilation. Some scholars believe it was a work of the fifth century. The Cūlavaṁsa is believed to have been written in the twelfth century. G.C. Mendis, ‘Pali Chronicles of Ceylon’, provides an excellent introductory survey. See also, S. Kiribamune, ‘The Mah•vaṁsa’ pp. 126–36.
6. The one exception is the Rajatarangini or The Kashmir Chronicle, composed in the twelfth century.
7. Two volumes published in 2001 and 2003 were the first to use these epigraphical sources in the writing of the history of Sri Lanka. These are Lakshman S. Perera, The Institutions of Ancient Ceylon from Inscriptions Vol. I (from the 3rd century to AD 830) and The Institutions of Ancient Ceylon from Institutions, Vol. II, Part I (from AD 831 to AD 1016). Volume II, Part II of this treatise is forthcoming in late 2005.
8. See particularly Deraniyagala, The Pre-History of Sri Lanka. This present brief survey of the island’s prehistory is based primarily on Deraniyagala’s two volumes and other essays by him. See also Senaratne, Prehistoric Archaeology in Ceylon.
9. See Seneviratne, ‘The Ecology and Archeology of the Seruvila Copper-Magnetite Prospect’, pp. 114–45.
10. On the Vijaya legend, see Basham, ‘Prince Vijaya and the Aryanisation of Ceylon’, pp. 172–91 and Mendis, ‘Pali Chronicles’, pp. 56–71.
11. The Mah•vaṁsa, Chapter VII verses 1–4, in Wilhelm Geiger, The Mah•vaṁsa or the Great Chronicle of Sri Lanka, p. 55.
12. There were several clans or families of the nobility in ancient Sri Lanka: the Lambakannas, Moriyas, Kalingas, Tarachchas, Balibhojakas and others. It is generally believed that these clan names had a totemistic origin—for instance, the emblem of the Moriyas was a peacock.
13. For a demolition of this myth as regards India, see Srinivas and Shah, ‘The Myth of Self-sufficiency of the Indian Village,’ pp. 1375–78.
14. See Deraniyagala, The Pre-History of Sri Lanka, Vol. II, pp. 739–50.
15. For a brief introduction to Buddhism, see Bhikkhu Rahula, What the Buddha Taught. See also Armstrong, Buddha. The Indian background to the emergence of Buddhism is reviewed in Thapar, A History of India, Chapter IV.
16. See Thapar, A History of India, pp. 85ff and Asoka and the Decline of the Mauryas.
17. Ficus religioso.
18. On the Pomparippu excavations and their significance see S. P. F. Senaratne, Prehistoric Archaesology in Ceylon; pp. 29–31; Indrapala, ‘Early Tamil Settlements in Ceylon’, pp. 15–33.
19. Since the Adichchanallur finds have been dated at around 300 BC, the same date is tentatively assigned to the Pomparippu complex which is regarded as being roughly contemporary with them.
20. Indrapala, ‘Early Tamil Settlements in Ceylon’, pp. 23ff; Kiribamune, ‘Tamils in Ancient and Medieval Sri Lanka’, pp. 9–23. See also P. Raghupathy, Early Settlements in Jaffna, pp. 179–87.
21. Indrapala, ‘Early Tamil Settlements in Ceylon’, p. 20.
22. This was made very clear by Lakshman S. Perera, in his chapter ‘The Early Kings of Ceylon up to Mutasiva’, pp. 98–111. See also Gunawardana’s ‘Prelude to the State’, pp. 83–122.
23. As the titles of the early Sinhalese rulers, g•mani and abhaya, show, leadership in the country in the remote past was of a military character. The g•mani abhayas or ‘warrior leaders’ of early settlements known as gama or janapada later evolved into formal rulers who assumed pretentious titles such as raja or maharaja.
24. The central highlands.
25. There is less written on the southern kingdoms in the Mah•vaṁsa than should have been; indeed, it could be described as a blindspot of the author or authors of the Mah•vaṁsa. Recently attempts have been made to re-examine the role of Rohana in Sri Lanka’s ancient history, using for the purpose the archaeological, literary and numismatic evidence now available. See particularly, Bopearachchi and Wickremesinhe, Ruhuna.
26. Deraniyagala, The Pre-History of Sri Lanka, Vol. II, pp. 712–50; Coningham and Allchin, ‘The Rise of Cities in Sri Lanka’, pp. 152–83.
27. On Mahatittha (M•ntota), see Kiribamune, ‘The Role of the Port City of Mahatittha (M•ntota) in the Trade Networks of the Indian Ocean’, pp. 435–54.
1. For the history of the Anuradhapura kingdom, Nicholas and Paranavitana, A Concise History of Ceylon, is still a good source. The book is a study of ancient Sri Lanka. The authors’ proclivity for fanciful theories in the later chapters of the book vitiates its usefulness. Fortunately, its chapters on the Anuradhapura kingdom are authoritative. Two earlier books, Codrington, A Short History of Ceylon and Mendis, Early History of Ceylon, can still be read with profit.
2. According to tradition, the Lambakannas had come to the island in the time of Dev•nampiya Tissa with the sacred bo-tree. The Tarachchas and Kaliṅgas, two less important clans, apparently came to the island at much the same time as the Lambakannas.
3. During much of this period, their rivals, the Moriyas, were on the retreat, quite often scattered over various parts of the island and occasionally—for instance, during the rule of Sabha (AD 120–27)—as refugees from Lambakanna persecution.
4. On the law of succession to the throne, or the lack of one, see Hettiarachchy, History of Kingship in Ceylon, pp. 172–74.
5. As early as the first century AD Illan•ga (AD 33–43) had used south Indian mercenaries to capture the throne. The next such episode came two centuries later with Abhayan•ga (231–40). The Moggall•na episode came two-and-a-half centuries later. See Kiribamune, ‘Tamils in Ancient and Medieval Sri Lanka’, p. 14.
6. Kiribamune, ‘Tamils in Ancient and Medieval Sri Lanka,’ pp. 14–15.
7. Ibid, pp. 14–15.
8. This theme is discussed in some detail in Perera, The Institutions of Ancient Ceylon from Inscriptions, Vol. I, pp. 34–44.
9. In the sixth century ad, a separate administrative division called Purathimadesa was created and placed directly in charge of the heir apparent. (This is evidence of the increasing economic importance of the Polonnaruva region.) But this administrative innovation appears to have been short-lived.
10. The smallest unit of administration was the gama or village which was under the authority of a gamika or village headman. There were also institutions of a more democratic character like the niyamatana which regulated the public life of the village.
11. On the Cōḷas see Nilakanta Sastri, A History of South India from Prehistoric Times to the Fall of Vijayanagar, and The Cōḷas; Spencer, The Politics of Expansion; Stein, Peasant State and Society in Medieval South India.
12. Spencer in his The Politics of Expansion, lays great emphasis on this point especially in regard to the Cōḷas and Sri Lanka.
13. Between the seventh and eighth centuries, four Sinhalese kings ruled from Polonnaruva in preference to Anuradhapura.
14. Kiribamune, ‘Trade Patterns of the Indian Ocean’, pp. 179–90.
1. Murphey, ‘The Ruin of Ancient Ceylon’, p. 185.
2. Nicholas, ‘A Short Account of the History of Irrigation Works’, pp. 43–69. The reference to Vasabha is on p. 48.
3. Parker, Ancient Ceylon, p. 379. The bisokotuva, a square enclosure built of stone slabs, facilitated the control of the pressure and the quantity of the outflow of water when it was released from a reservoir or tank into the canals.
4. Ibid.
5. See Nicholas, ‘A Short Account of the History of Irrigation Works’. See also Gunawardana, ‘Irrigation and Hydraulic Society in Early Medieval Ceylon’, pp. 3–27. The outstanding history of Sri Lanka’s irrigation system, Brohier’s Ancient Irrigation Works in Ceylon, discusses these works in great detail.
6. On this canal, see Brohier, The History of Irrigation and Agricultural Colonisation in Ceylon, pp. 6–8.
7. The fact that the chronicles credit a king with the construction of certain public works does not necessarily imply that they were all begun and completed in his reign. The actual building operations would have lasted more than one reign or even one generation and utilized the labour of farmers during the slack season of the agricultural cycle. Instances are known of the chronicles giving a king credit for a project which he only initiated or completed.
8. One of the themes neglected in the Mah•vaṁsa and Cūlavamsa, in the emphasis given to major irrigation works, is the contribution made by village tanks. It is only very recently that a serious study of village tanks has been made. See Panabokke, The Small Tank Cascade Systems of the R•jarata.
9. Brohier, ‘The Inter-relation of Groups of Ancient Reservoirs and Channels in Sri Lanka,’ pp. 64–85. The quotation is from p. 70.
10. Gunawardana, ‘Irrigation and Hydraulic Society’, p. 9.
11. Brohier, ‘The Inter-relation of Groups of Ancient Reservoirs and Channels in Sri Lanka’.
12. See Chapter 2.
13. Nicholas, ‘A Short Account of the History of Irrigation Works’, p. 57.
14. Gunawardana, ‘Total Power or Shared Power?’, pp. 73–80.
15. Nicholas, ‘A Short Account of the History of Irrigation Works’, p. 60.
16. Murphey, ‘The Ruin of Ancient Ceylon’, p. 184.
17. See Wittfogel, Oriental Despotism, pp. 569–611. Wittfogel was an unrepentant believer in the ‘Asiatic Mode of Production’ as propounded by Marx in the mid-nineteenth century.
18. See Gunawardane, ‘Irrigation and Hydraulic Society’, and Leach, ‘Hydraulic Society in Ceylon’, pp. 2–26.
19. An excellent index to the public perception of irrigation works among the literati of those times is the assessment of a king’s contribution to public life in the M•havaṁsa and the Cūlavaṁsa and the prominence given to irrigation in such assessments.
20. See Panabokke, The Small Tank Cascade Systems of the R•jarata, for a discussion on this. See also Nicholas, ‘A Short Account of the History of Irrigation Works’, pp. 46–7.
1. Prickett, ‘Sri Lanka’s Foreign Trade Before AD 600’; Bopearachchi, ‘Seafaring in the Indian Ocean’, pp. 59–77.
2. Kiribamune, ‘The Role of the Port City of Mahatittha’, pp. 435–54; ‘Muslims and the Trade of the Arabian Sea’, pp. 89–108; ‘Trade Patterns of the Indian Ocean’, pp. 67–78; Sirisena, ‘Sri Lanka’s Commercial Relations with the Outside World’, pp. 12–21; ‘Maritime Commerce’, pp. 1–33.
3. B.J. Perera, ‘Foreign Trade and Commerce of Ancient Ceylon: The Ports of Ancient Ceylon’, pp. 109–19; ‘Foreign Trade and Commerce of Ancient Ceylon: Ancient Ceylon and Its Trade with India’, pp. 192–204; ‘Foreign Trade and Commerce of Ancient Ceylon: Ancient Ceylon’s Trade with the Empires of the Eastern and Western Worlds’, pp. 301–20.
4. Chaudhuri, Trade and Civilisation in the Indian Ocean, is an excellent general study of the subject.
5. Bopearachchi and Wickremesinhe, Ruhuna, p. 42.
6. Weerakkody, Taprobanê, p. 1.
7. Bopearachchi and Wickremesinhe, Ruhuna, p. 42.
8. Ibid., Introduction, p. 7.
9. On south India’s flourishing trade with Rome, see Kulke and Rothermund, A History of India, pp. 99–102.
10. Kiribamune, ‘The Role of the Port City of Mahatittha’ pp. 435–54.
11. See Kulke and Rothermund, A History of India, pp. 105–06, 146, 148 on the Pallavas.
12. Kiribamune, ‘Trade Patterns of the Indian Ocean’, p. 68. See also Sirisena, ‘Maritime Commerce’ pp. 1–33.
13. On the Palas, see Kulke and Rothermund, A History of India, pp. 111–13.
14. Many chapters in Bandaranayake et al. (eds), Sri Lanka and the Silk Road of the Sea, provide glimpses of Sri Lankan naval craft, shipbuilding and traders and sailors, engaged in external trade. See particularly, Gunawardana, ‘Seaways to Seiladiba’, pp. 25–44, and Gunawardana and Sakura, ‘Sri Lankan Ships in China’, pp. 277–80.
15. See Hornell, Water Transport, pp. 254, 258.
16. For the substance of this paragraph and the next, I have relied on Bopearachchi and Wickremesinhe, Ruhuna, pp. 15–30, and Bopearachchi, ‘Ancient Coins in Sri Lanka’, pp. 21–26.
17. The discussion here is based on the publications of Lakshman S. Perera, in particular his The Institutions of Ancient Ceylon from Inscriptions, Vol. 1. There is also his ‘Proprietary and Tenurial Rights’, pp. 1–32.
18. Perera, The Institutions of Ancient Ceylon from Inscriptions, Vol. 1, pp. 69–75, 149.
19. Ibid., see pp. 179–83 for a definition of bojakapathi.
20. The inscriptions refer to the owners of tanks (vapi-hamika) as well as to the practice of donating water charges from tanks to the sangha.
21. Perera, The Institutions of Ancient Ceylon from Inscriptions, Vol. 1, pp. 183–88 for a definition of dakapathi.
22. Gunawardana, ‘Hydraulic Society in Medieval Ceylon’, pp. 19–20.
23. Gunawardana, ‘Some Economic Aspects of Monastic Life’, pp. 71–72.
24. Karunatilaka, ‘Early Sri Lankan Society’, pp. 108–43.
1. Kiribamune, ‘The State and Sangha in Pre-Modern Sri Lanka’, pp. 201–16; Liyanagamage, ‘Conflicts in State-Sangha Relations’, pp. 165–201. The most comprehensive work on Buddhism in Sri Lanka in the Anuradhapura period is the Revd Walpola Rahula’s History of Buddhism in Ceylon. I have relied on it greatly in this chapter, as well as on Paranavitana’s two chapters on Buddhism in the University of Ceylon, Vol. 1(I) (hereafter UCHC), pp. 125–44 and 241–68. See also Adikaram, Early History of Buddhism in Ceylon, and Paranavitana, Sinhalayo.
2. Paranavitana, ‘Civilisation of the Early Period’, p. 241.
3. Ibid., pp. 250–5.
4. Rahula, History of Buddhism in Ceylon, p. 58.
5. Ibid., pp. 73–4, 96–7.
6. There were in Sri Lanka, apart from the tooth relic, the collarbone, hair relics and the alms bowl of the Buddha.
7. See Paranavitana, ‘Mahayanism in Ceylon’, pp. 35–71.
8. In this section of the present chapter I have relied on the following authorities: Coomaraswamy, History of Indian and Indonesian Art; Ludowyk, Footprint of the Buddha; Paranavitana, Sinhalayo, and his contributions on religion and art in UCHC, Vol. I, pp. 241–67 and pp. 378–409; Rowland, The Art and Architecture of India.
9. There is no evidence of stupas in Sri Lanka before the introduction of Buddhism. No stupa built in this period is preserved today without alteration in shape or addition. The form of the oldest stupas was the same as that of the monument at Sanchi, the oldest preserved example of the type in India. There are six types of stupas in Sri Lanka, all described by reference to their shape: a bell, a pot, a bubble, a heap of paddy, a lotus and an amalaka fruit.
10. Under a load comparable to that of an Egyptian pyramid, the foundations have shown no signs of settlement after 2,000 years.
11. This was higher than the present St Paul’s Cathedral in London and slightly lower than St Peter’s in Rome.
12. Terraces of beams were added to the hemispherical dome of the d•gäba at its base; the larger stupas had more elaborate terraces than the smaller ones.
13. Moonstones are semicircular slabs richly decorated in low relief and placed at the foot of a stairway leading to a major shrine, with a standard pattern consisting of several concentric bands of ornament, beginning with an outer zone of luxuriant foliage followed by a spirited procession of animals—the horse, elephant, ox and lion—remarkable for their poise and probably symbolizing the four quarters of the world. This band of animals is followed by a belt of stylized vegetation and then a row of hamsa (sacred geese) dangling flowers in their beaks. The innermost bands are all inspired by the lotus plant and culminating in stylized lotus petals of great delicacy. The vitality of the carving is matched by an extraordinary restraint.
14. On the Buddha images we now have the works of Ulrich von Schroeder, the truly monumental Buddhist Sculptures of Sri Lanka and The Golden Age of Sculpture in Sri Lanka. See also Dohanian, The Mahayana Buddhist Sculpture of Ceylon.
15. Ulrich von Schroeder, The Golden Age of Sculpture in Sri Lanka, p. 51.
16. A seven-headed cobra forms a halo above the rich tiara of the n•ga king and in his upraised hand he holds a vase of plenty, sprouting forth prosperity and abundance.
17. For a discussion of this, see Bandaranayake’s Sigiriya: City, Palace and Royal Gardens, pp. 112–35. This sumptuous publication contains a number of essays by reputed scholars, but unfortunately it has no editor.
18. The Pali commentaries of Buddhaghosa and Dhammapala were based on the old Sinhalese exegetical texts which were preserved in the Mah•vihara as late as the tenth century.
19. He was a Brahman (probably south Indian) convert to Buddhism.
20. Paranavitana, Sigiri Graffiti, Being Sinhalese Verses of the Eighth, Ninth, and Tenth Centuries.
1. See UCHC, 1(2), Book IV, Chapters I–V, pp. 411–87, 507–25; Book V, Chapter I, pp. 613–34; and CHJ, IV, 1954–55, special number on the Polonnaruva period.
2. Culavaṁsa, LXXX, verses 54–59, p. 132.
3. Ibid., LXXX, verses 61–70, pp. 132–33.
4. Ibid., verses 75–79, pp. 133–34.
5. Par•kramab•hu and Sri Vallabha were direct descendants of Mitta, a sister of Vijayab•hu I. The former was her grandson and the latter her great-grandson (the son of M•nabharana, Par•kramab•hu’s cousin).
6. See Sirisena, Ceylon and South-east Asia; Taylor, ‘The Early Kingdoms’, pp. 137–81; Hall, ‘Economic History of Early South-east Asia’, pp. 137–81, 240–59; de Casparis and Mabbett, ‘Religion and Popular Beliefs of Southeast Asia’, pp. 281–321; de Casparis, ‘Senarat Paranavitana Memorial Lecture’, pp. 229–40; Frasch, ‘The Buddhist Connection’, pp. 85–98.
7. Frasch, ‘The Buddhist Connection’, pp. 89–92; de Casparis and Mabbett, ‘Religion and Popular Beliefs of Southeast Asia’, pp. 295–96.
8. Hall, ‘Economic History of Early Southeast Asia’, p. 249.
9. Ibid., p. 250.
10. Ibid.
11. On Chandrabh•nu’s invasion p. 250. see Sirisena, Ceylon and South-east Asia, pp. 36–57.
12. Paranavitana, ‘The Arya Kingdom in North Ceylon’, pp. 174–224.
13. See UCHC, 1(2), pp. 553–57; Nicholas, ‘The Irrigation Works of King Par•kramab•hu I’, pp. 52–68.
14. Gunawardana, ‘Irrigation and Hydraulic Society in Medieval Ceylon’, pp. 12 ff.
15. Ibid.
16. Tennent, Ceylon, p. 432.
17. Siriweera, ‘Land Tenure and Revenue in Medieval Ceylon’, pp. 2–3.
18. Ibid., pp. 5–49; see also Siriweera, History of Sri Lanka: From Earliest Times up to the Sixteenth Century, pp. 146–67.
19. See Gunawardana, Robe and Plough, pp. 282–312.
20. Frasch, ‘A Buddhist Network’, pp. 69–92.
21. Wijesekera, ‘P•li and Sanskrit in the Polonnaruva Period’, pp. 91–97; Saparamadu, ‘The Sinhalese Language and Literature of the Polonnaruva Period’, pp. 98–112.
22. Rowland, The Art and Architecture of India, p. 375.
23. Ibid., p. 378.
24. The vatad•gē, the most remarkable architectural monument to be seen at Polonnaruva, is of the same type as the circular shrines enclosing stupas at the Thūpar•ma and Lank•rama at Anuradhapura. This architectural type is a development from the circular cetiya-ghara of India. The vatad•gē is the most developed example of this type.
25. This is the view of Paranavitana, ‘The Art and Architecture of the Polonnaruva Period’, p. 75. See also Sirisena, Ceylon and South-east Asia, pp. 110–43.
26. Rowland, The Art and Architecture of India, p. 375, is a supporter of the view that this monument was evidence of the affinity between the architecture of Polonnaruva and that of Cambodia and Burma. See also Guruge, ‘The Sri Lankan Factor’, pp. 245–52.
27. See Prematilake and Karunaratna, ‘Polonnaruva’, pp. 86–111. This collection of essays does not have an editor.
1. See Indrapala (ed.), The Collapse of the R•jarata Civilization.
2. See, Liyanagamage, The Decline of Polonnaruva.
3. Murphey, ‘The Ruin of Ancient Ceylon’, pp. 181–200.
4. p. 83.
5. Ibid., pp. 198–200.
6. On the Gampola kings, see Abeyasinghe, ‘The History of the Kandyan Kingdom’, pp. 429–47.
7. On Sen•dhilank•ra and the Alagakkōn•ras, see Kulasuriya, ‘Regional Independence’, pp. 136–55.
8. On Zheng He’s naval activities, see Ma Huan, Ying-yai Sheny-lan; Levathes, When China Ruled the Seas. On the Sri Lankan episode, see Somaratne, ‘Grand Eunuch Ho and Ceylon’, pp. 36–47.
9. The Kublai Khan mission sought the bowl and hair relics as well.
10. On the history of the Kotte kingdom, see Somaratne, Political History of the Kingdom of Kotte.
11. There is even less information on the economy of the Tamil kingdom.
12. See C.R. de Silva, ‘Trade in Ceylon Cinnamon’, pp. 14–27, especially pp. 15–16.
13. C.R. de Silva, ‘The First Portuguese Revenue Register’, pp. 1–83, especially pp. 22–34.
14. There appears to have been no restrictions over the practice of their religion and they no doubt built mosques at the more important of their settlements. No mosque dating from this period has survived.
15. See UCHC, 1(2), Book V, Chapter IV, pp. 770–76; Hettiarachchi and Paranavitana, UCHC, 1 (2), Chapter IV, pp. 778–93.
16. Generally, a message in verse carried by a bird and addressed to a deity asking for a benediction on a king or some important personage.
1. See Abeyasinghe, ‘The History of the Kandyan Kingdom’, pp. 429–47.
2. Indrapala, ‘Dravidian Settlements in Ceylon’; ‘Early Tamil Settlements in Ceylon’, Chapter 2 in Gunawardana et al., Reflections on a Heritage, pp. 15–33; ‘Early Tamil Settlements in Ceylon’, pp. 1–28.
3. Kiribamune, ‘Tamils in Ancient and Medieval Sri Lanka’, pp. 9–23.
4. Paranavitana, ‘The Arya Kingdom in North Ceylon’, pp. 174–224.
5. Indrapala, ‘Dravidian Settlements in Ceylon’, pp. 6–7.
6. Indrapala, ‘Early Tamil Settlements in Ceylon’, p. 18.
7. Ibid., p. 18.
8. Ibid., p. 19.
9. Ibid.
10. Ibid., p. 24.
11. Indrapala, ‘Early Tamil Settlements in Ceylon’, p. 44.
12. Ibid, pp. 54–55.
13. Ibid, p. 60.
14. Ibid.
15. Ibid., pp. 61–62.
16. Ibid., p. 62.
17. For a study of these problems the reader could consult Gunasinghe, The Tamils of Sri Lanka. Gunasinghe was a civil servant with a deep and abiding interest in historical research. He was awarded a PhD in 1980 by the University of Peradeniya on his dissertation entitled ‘The Political History of Yapahuva, Kurunegala and Gampola’. See also C.R. Liyanagamage, The Decline of Polonnaruva, and Pathmanathan, The Kingdom of Jaffna.
18. For discussion of the theme of the Portuguese conquest of Jaffna, see Abeyasinghe, Jaffna Under the Portuguese. See also C.R. de Silva, The Portuguese in Ceylon. The map which serves as the frontispiece to the latter book shows the boundaries of the Jaffna kingdom as they were at the time of the Portuguese conquest of Jaffna.
19. On the Vanni districts and their history in the centuries after the collapse of the Polonnaruva kingdom, see Indrapala, ‘Dravidian Settlements in Ceylon’, Chapter V, pp. 306–16. See also his ‘The Origin of the Tamil Vanni Chieftaincies of Ceylon’, pp. 111–40; Pathmanathan, ‘Feudal Polity in Medieval Ceylon’, pp. 118–30.
20. See Abeyasinghe, ‘The History of the Kandyan Kingdom’, pp. 429–71.
21. Kulasuriya, ‘Regional Independence and Elite Change’, pp. 136–55.
22. See Liyanagamage, ‘Kerelas in Medieval Sri Lankan History’, pp. 76–93.
1. See C.R. de Silva, ‘The First Portuguese Revenue Register’, pp. 1–83, especially pp. 22–34.
2. See Abeyasinghe, ‘The History of the Kandyan Kingdom’, pp. 433–34.
3. See MacGregor’s chapter ‘Europe and the East’ in the New Cambridge Modern History III.
4. The fort built by the Portuguese at Colombo in 1519 was dismantled in 1524. Between 1520 and 1550, they had a great degree of control if not monopoly over the cinnamon trade without the need for a fort.
5. The most comprehensive study of the Sīt•vaka kingdom is by C.R. de Silva, first of all his, ‘The Rise and Fall of the Kingdom of Sīt•vaka’, pp. 1–43 followed by his ‘The Rise and Fall of the Kingdom of Sīt•vaka (1521–1593)’, Chapter III, pp. 61–104.
6. At the time Bhuvenakab•hu was killed, de Noronha had left the island; he returned on hearing of the king’s death.
7. Perhaps the most important of all, de Noronha had news that some of the petty rulers of Malabar, who had control of the region’s pepper supplies, were planning a boycott of the Portuguese. One of the Portuguese viceroy’s prime responsibilities was to see that a cargo of pepper was despatched annually to Lisbon. Noronha returned to his headquarters and with a show of force cajoled these recalcitrant Malabaris into supplying the Portuguese with pepper.
8. R•jasimha’s conversion to Hinduism is regarded as having alienated the people from him, or at least weakened their enthusiasm for his cause. There is reason to doubt this. A strong commitment to Hinduism was nothing unusual in Sinhalese rulers. As we have seen, some of the Kotte kings and the elite in Kotte had been distinctly more favourable to Hinduism than to Buddhism.
1. See Abeyasinghe, ‘The Myth of the Malwana Convention’, pp. 67–72.
2. The last major rebellion against the Portuguese was in 1630 in Badulla.
3. The rebellions of Kuruvita R•la and Nikapitiyē Band•ra were in the Two and Seven Kōralēs respectively.
4. Abeyasinghe, Portuguese Rule in Ceylon, pp. 12–28.
5. Senarat married the widowed Kusum•sana Devi after the death of Vimala Dharma Sūriya.
6. C.R. de Silva, The Portuguese in Ceylon, Chapters II, III and IV.
7. For a discussion on this treaty, see Goonewardena, The Foundation of Dutch Power in Ceylon, pp. 17–19, 32–36.
8. During the period 1629–36 Dutch cruisers destroyed nearly 150 Portuguese ships, most of them in the straits of Malacca or off the Malabar coast. There were also several blockades of the principal Iberian naval bases at Goa, Malacca and Manila. Goa was blockaded nine times between 1637 and 1644.
9. Goonewardena, The Foundation of Dutch Power in Ceylon, pp. 32–36.
10. See Boxer, ‘The Portuguese in the East’, pp. 232–44, and ‘Portuguese and Dutch Colonial Rivalry’, on which this discussion is based.
11. Nevertheless the indifference or incompetence of the Spanish government in Madrid was not the primary cause of the defeat of the Portuguese in Sri Lanka and south India. The decline of the Portuguese Asian empire continued apace under the rule of the native dynasty of Braganza which was restored in 1640 under Joao IV. In brief, it was Portugal rather than Spain which must bear the responsibility for the debacle in south Asia in the mid-seventeenth century.
12. There were attempts to establish ‘colonies’ of Portuguese settlers on the island. Though they made some progress, they came nowhere near being a steady source of supply of manpower for the Portuguese army.
13. See Winius, The Fatal History of Portuguese Ceylon.
14. The rulers of Kotte had revenue records of their own, and it would appear that the first Portuguese thōmbo was based in part at least on these.
15. Abeyasinghe, Portuguese Rule in Ceylon, pp. 120–21.
16. Ibid., p. 119.
17. Many of the gabad•gam given out on quitrent lost their character as villages reserved for the king. This transformation was partly the result of land-grabbing in the chaotic conditions of the last decade of the sixteenth century, but most grants of gabad•gam were made as a matter of policy as rewards for loyal supporters.
18. C.R. de Silva, The Portuguese in Ceylon, pp. 215–35.
19. Ibid., pp. 221 ff.
20. Ibid., p. 224.
21. Ibid., pp. 226–35.
22. Ibid., p. 235
23. On the cinnamon trade, see particularly de Silva, Ibid, pp. 190–201. and his article, ‘Trade in Ceylon Cinnamon in the Sixteenth Century’, pp. 14–27.
24. On Portuguese missionary methods, see Boxer, ‘Christians and Spices’, pp. 346–54 and ‘A Note on Portuguese Missionary Methods’, pp. 77–90.
25. Quoted in Boxer, ‘The Portuguese in the East’, p. 244.
1. The analysis in this section of the present chapter is based largely on Arasaratnam, Dutch Power in Ceylon.
2. To the west and south-west, R•jasimha II had annexed large parts of the territories under Portuguese control including the vitally important Seven Kōralēs, the greater part of the Sabaragamuva and the eastern half of the Four Kōralēs. On the east, R•jasimha obtained control over the ports of Trincomalee, Kottiy•r and Batticaloa.
3. One of these captives was Robert Knox who later wrote a celebrated book on the Kandyan kingdom, An Historical Relation of Ceylon.
4. Ryklof van Goens participated in these deliberations at Batavia as a member of the council there. But, strongly opposed to this resolution, he did not sign the instructions sent to Sri Lanka.
1. Dewaraja, A Study of the Political, Administrative and Social Structure of the Kandyan Kingdom; see also Roberts, Sinhala Consciousness in the Kandyan Period.
2. Up to the time of R•jasimha II there had been only one adig•r. He added a second, and in the early years of the nineteenth century, the last Kandyan king appointed a third—perhaps as a means of dividing the authority of the adig•rs and reducing their powers.
3. Although bhikkhus had no official position in this council, the most influential among them could be summoned when required to participate in its discussions.
4. These were Udunuvara, Yatinuwara, Tumpane, Harispattuwa, Dumbara, Hevaheta, Kotmale, Uda Bulatgama and Pata Bulatgama.
5. By the end of the eighteenth century there were twelve dis•vonies. The ratas and dis•vonies were generally of equal status.
6. The only towns of note were Senkadagala (modern Kandy), Nilambe, Alutnuvara, Badulla and Hanguranketa, all of which were royal residences at one time or another.
7. On the secularization of caste in Sri Lanka, see R. Pieris, Sinhalese Social Organisation, especially Part V, and Hocart, Caste: A Comparative Study.
8. Derived from the Sinhalese hēn or hēna.
9. A plot of land cleared for chēna cultivation was generally abandoned after two crops were taken from it.
10. Wickremasekara, ‘The Social and Political Organisation of the Kandyan Kingdom’, p. 90.
11. Certain castes of people paid miscellaneous duties to the king in iron, steel, salt, oil, ghee, betel and jaggery.
12. The organization and superintendence of these compulsory services, which could include service in the militia, lay with the dis•vas, with the king retaining the right to exempt anyone from these services.
13. This tax was abolished by Kīrti Śrī R•jasimha, but it was revived in the early nineteenth century by the last king of Kandy, Sri Vikrama R•jasimha.
14. Arasaratnam, ‘Vimala Dharma Sūriya II’, pp. 59–70.
15. For discussions on this, see Arasaratnam, ‘Introduction: The Dutch in Ceylon and South India’, especially pp. 1–36.
16. See Fernando, ‘An Account of the Kandyan Mission sent to Siam’, pp. 37–83; Jayatilaka, ‘Sinhalese Embassies to Arakan’, pp. 1–6; P.E.Pieris, ‘An Account of Kīrti Śrī’s Embassy to Siam’, pp. 17–41; see also Malalgoda, Buddhism in Sinhalese Society.
17. See Chapter 14, this volume, for a discussion on this.
18. The theme of peasant unrest in the littoral is reviewed in Chapter 13, this volume.
19. Dewaraja, The Kandyan Kingdom of Sri Lanka pp. 26–91.
20. This was especially so with the accession of Kīrti Śrī R•jasimha to the Kandyan throne in 1747. He sought and obtained a bride of the N•yakkar lineage from south India. Subsequently he married two other N•yakkar princesses. There were thus from this time a number of N•yakkar chiefs in court in positions of power and influence.
21. On the Dutch wars with Kandy, see Paulusz, ‘The Outbreak of the Kandyan-Dutch War’, pp. 29–52; Paulusz (ed.), Secret Minutes of the Dutch Political Council, pp. 1–19, Paulusz’s introduction; Raven-Hart, The Dutch Wars with Kandy.
22. On the treaty of 1766, see Arasaratnam, ‘Dutch Sovereignty in Ceylon’, pp. 105–21.
1. Sales in Asia were kept down to one-fifth of that in the more lucrative European market. In this way prices were maintained at an artificially high level so that it would be unprofitable for the company’s competitors to buy cinnamon in Asia for sale in Europe.
2. Because of the monopoly imposed by the VOC, the Kandyan kingdom could not sell cinnamon through its ports to traders who called there. As a result, its economy was deprived of a valuable item of exchange with which to finance imports.
3. The destruction of a cinnamon plant, the unauthorized peeling of its bark, private trade in cinnamon and the transport of cinnamon were all placed in the category of offences for which the death penalty could be imposed. To enforce these draconian measures the jungles were systematically patrolled.
4. In an attempt to protect their children from these oppressive tenurial obligations, the Sal•gamas often avoided registering their children with the Mahabadda.
5. Kotelawele, ‘Agrarian Policies of the Dutch’, pp. 3–33; see particularly p. 16ff.
6. Ibid., pp. 19–32.
7. In 1753 he placed a ban on chēnas but this was lifted within a year and in 1754 the clearing of land for chēnas was permitted under rigorous controls though the conversion of chēnas into gardens was strictly prohibited. This remained the basis of Dutch land policy, such as it was, till 1767.
8. Where they had legal title they were provided with title deeds which, apart from other considerations, was viewed as a useful method of introducing the indigenous population to the practice of land surveys previously attempted without much success during the administration of van Gollenesse.
9. We have little reliable information on the demographic trends of this period. The Dutch records refer to an increase in population and attribute this without much explanation to an excess of births over deaths.
10. Kanapathypillai, ‘Dutch Rule in Maritime Ceylon’, pp. 250–53.
11. Ibid., pp. 298–307.
12. Mattau, ‘Governor van Imhoff’, pp. 55–67.
13. See Kanapathypillai, ‘Dutch Rule in Maritime Ceylon’, pp. 272–73.
14. See Chapter 14, this volume.
15. On the thōmbos see Chapter 15, this volume.
16. Kanapathypillai, ‘Dutch Rule in Maritime Ceylon’, pp. 275–79.
17. See Arasaratnam (ed.), Memoir of Julius Stein van Gollenesse, pp. 28–35; Arasaratnam, ‘Dutch Commercial Policies in Ceylon’, pp. 109–30, and ‘Baron van Imhoff and Dutch Policy in Ceylon, 1736–1740’, pp. 454–66.
18. The trade was conducted on his behalf by the merchants of Quilon. The entire harvest in Jaffna was taken to Quilon and sold to the raja, who in turn released it for sale within his kingdom at a fixed price. He closely guarded this monopoly, and neither the merchants of Jaffna nor the Dutch had any share in these transactions. This trade continued well into the nineteenth century.
19. For further discussion on this, see Chapter 11, this volume.
1. See Colgate, ‘The Royal Navy and Trincomalee’, pp. 1–6.
2. On the impact of the treaty of 1766 on relations between the VOC and the Kandyans, see Kanapathypillai, ‘Dutch Rule in Maritime Ceylon’, pp. 74–138.
3. See Mendis, ‘The Advent of the British to Ceylon’; Boxer, The Dutch Seaborne Empire; Harlow, The Founding of the Second British Empire; Toussaint, A History of the Indian Ocean.
4. Kanapathypillai, ‘Dutch Rule in Maritime Ceylon’, pp. 144–49.
5. Ibid., pp. 158–203.
1. On the VOC’s administrative structure in Sri Lanka, see Arasaratnam, ‘The Administrative Organisation of the Dutch East India Company in Ceylon’, pp. 1–13.
2. Ibid., p. 5.
3. Ibid., p. 1.
4. See P.E. Pieris, The Ceylon Littoral-1593, pp. 27–8.
5. When these restrictions were set aside by the British we find a significant number of Muslim entering the business of revenue farming in the early nineteenth century.
6. Kotelawele, ‘Agrarian Policies of the Dutch’, pp. 28–9.
7. In the first few decades after the establishment of Dutch rule, high-ranking officials of the VOC appropriated the best lands to their private use and this abuse was so widespread that Governor Pyl was obliged to step in and take back the land so alienated.
8. Nadaraja, The Legal System of Ceylon, pp. 3–56.
9. Cited in Nadaraja, Ibid., p. 13.
10. Nadaraja, Ibid., pp. 12–16.
11. For discussion on this see Nadaraja, ‘The Law’, pp. 327–42.
12. See Kotelawele, ‘Nature of Class Relations’, particularly p. 11.
13. Kotelawele, ‘Agrarian Policies of the Dutch’, pp. 1–12, pp. 3–33.
14. See Boudens, The Catholic Church in Ceylon’, pp. 1–266.
15. There was a measure of force used to see that baptized Christians though not others conformed to and practised their faith regularly.
16. Arasaratnam, Memoir of Julius Stein van Gollenesse, p. 38.
17. Ibid., p. 38.
18. Ibid., pp. 38–39.
19. Boxer, The Dutch Seaborne Empire, pp. 147–49.
20. The Rt Revd Bishop Edmund Pieris, ‘Sinhalese Christian Literature’, pp. 163–81 and ‘Tamil Catholic Literature’, pp. 229–44.
21. On Gonçalves, see Fr S.G. Perera, Life of Father Jacome Gonçalves.
22. These anti-Buddhist polemics were among the main reasons why King Śrī Vijaya R•jasimha ordered the Roman Catholic priests out of the Kandyan kingdom at the beginning of his reign.
23. An even more remarkable example of this was the canals constructed by the VOC in Sri Lanka. See Chapter 13, this volume.
24. See Brohier, ‘Ceylon-Dutch Domestic Art’, pp. 75–79.
25. Brohier, Furniture of the Dutch Period in Ceylon. See also Pearson, ‘European Chairs in Ceylon’. pp. 77–101.
26. This is seen in many Dutch words absorbed into the Sinhalese language to describe parts of a house and the furniture in it.
1. On this theme, see Malalgoda, Buddhism in Sinhalese Society, especially pp. 57–58.
2. Ibid., pp. 58–60.
3. Ibid., p. 61ff.
4. Ibid., p. 64.
5. Dewaraja, A Study of the Political, Administrative and Social Structure of the Kandyan Kingdom, p. 130.
6. Malalgoda, Buddhism in Sinhalese Society, pp. 87–105.
7. The basis of the classical tradition was a sound knowledge of Pali and Sanskrit. Its poetry adhered to the tenets of the Sanskrit mah•k•vya, and its prose works were based on the Buddhist scriptures, or important elements in Buddhist worship such as the tooth relic or the sacred bo-tree.
8. This poetry was lacking in any fine sensibility, its language was coarse rather than merely bawdy, and a good many of the verses were more pornographic than elegantly Rabelaisian.
9. Malalgoda, Buddhism in Sinhalese Society, p. 64.
10. Coomaraswamy, Medieval Sinhalese Art, p. 12, quoted in Malalgoda, Ibid., p. 64.
11. MacDougall, ‘Domestic Architecture Among the Kandyan Sinhalese’.
1. See Brynn, ‘The Marquess Wellesley’, pp. 1–13; see also Adler, ‘Britain and the Defence of India’.
2. Brynn, ‘The Marquess Wellesley’. See also Ingram (ed.), Two Views of British India.
3. Dutch judges refused to continue in service beyond the time stipulated in the Articles of Capitulation, although they were urged to do so by the new administration. Dutch clergymen were even more reluctant.
4. Wickremeratne, ‘The English East India Company’, pp. 131–55.
5. An important aspect of this, relations with the Kandyan kingdom, is treated in Chapter 18, this volume.
6. Uliyam—the residence taxes on Muslims and Chetties; also the obligation to enumerated service in Jaffna, as well as its partial or total commutation.
7. Capitation taxes were paid by the Nallavas and Pallas, two castes of slaves in Jaffna.
8. On the rebellion of 1817–18, see Chapter 18, this volume.
9. The decision to establish the system of dual control had little to do with the rebellion of 1797–98. This had been decided upon before news of the rebellion reached Britain.
10. For discussion of North’s attitude to the Muslims, see Wickremeratne, ‘The English East India Company’, pp. 140–55.
11. Dundas, private letter to Wellesley, 11 September 1800, in Ingram (ed.), Two Views of British India, pp. 297–98.
12. Brynn, ‘The Marquess Wellesley’, pp. 4–13.
1. This is a revised version of my chapter of the same title in UCHC, III. For further reading, see P.E. Pieris, Tri Sinhala; Sinhale and the Patriots; and R. Pieris, Sinhalese Social Organisation.
2. Wickremeratne, ‘Lord North and the Kandyan Kingdom’, pp. 30–42.
3. On the Kandyan wars of the nineteenth century, see Powell, The Kandyan Wars.
4. See Powell, ‘The Fall of Kandy 1815’, pp. 114–22.
1. See Samaraweera, ‘The Cinnamon Trade of Ceylon’, pp. 415–42. On the economy of the colony in the early nineteenth century, see the same author’s chapter ‘Land Policy and Peasant Colonisation, 1914–1948’, in UCHC, III, pp. 446–60.
2. The new contract guaranteed the colony an income of £101,000 per annum. In contrast, the contracts of 1802 and 1806 had brought the colony a return of above £60,000 annually.
3. Arasaratnam, ‘Dutch Commercial Policies in Ceylon’, pp. 109–30.
4. Samaraweera, ‘Land Policy and Peasant Colonisation’, UCHC, III, pp. 50–54.
5. On the Colebrooke-Cameron reforms, see Samaraweera, ‘Governor Sir Robert Wilmot Horton’, pp. 209–28; see also the same author’s chapter on the Colebrooke-Cameron Reforms in UCHC, III, pp. 77–88; K.M. de Silva, ‘The Colebrooke-Cameron Reforms’, pp. 245–56.
6. See Malalgoda, Buddhism in Sinhalese Society, pp. 87–105.
7. K.M. de Silva, ‘Religion and the State in the Early Nineteenth Century’, pp. 66–76.
8. See K.M. de Silva, ‘Influence of the English Evangelical Movement’, pp. 375–85.
1. For a review of the administration of the colony in the early nineteenth century, see Samaraweera, ‘The Development of the Administrative System from 1802 to 1832’, UCHC, III, pp. 34–47.
2. For discussion on this, see K.M. de Silva, ‘The Legislative Council in the Nineteenth Century’, pp. 226–48.
1. For discussion on these themes, see K.M. de Silva, Social Policy and Missionary Organisations, pp. 29–137.
2. Gate or guard mudaliy•rs were attached to the governor’s office and served as translators and interpreters.
3. K.M. de Silva, Social Policy and Missionary Organisations, pp. 64–137.
4. Boyd, ‘Ceylon and its Pioneers’, pp. 217–82.; Breckenridge, The Hills of Paradise, particularly Chapter V, pp. 31–38; Webb Jr, Tropical Pioneers, pp. 69–71.
5. Nearly half these plantations were formed between 1844 and 1846.
6. Successive reductions in the import duty on coffee had seen an increase in its consumption in Britain from 1 ounce per person per annum in 1801 to 1 lb 5¼ oz in 1831. The consumption of colonial coffee more than doubled between 1840 and 1848.
7. During the second half of the nineteenth century, the volume of cinnamon annually exported was actually larger than the average annual export in the first half, but since the quality was markedly inferior and the prices generally low, increased production did not yield a corresponding increase in revenue to the state or to the producer.
8. Boyd, ‘Autobiography’, p. 249ff.
9. Rigg, On ‘Coffee Planting in Ceylon’, pp. 123–42.
10. Tinker, A New System of Slavery.
11. See K.M. de Silva, ‘The Third Earl Grey’, pp. 5–20.
12. The customs revenue rose from £78,000 in 1843 to £100,000 in 1845; the revenue from land sales increased from £19,914 in 1840 (being more than double that of 1839) to £94,000 in 1845.
1. See Roberts and Wickremeratne, ‘Export Agriculture in the Nineteenth Century’, UCHC, III, pp. 89–118; Breckenridge, The Hills of Paradise.
2. In 1854, they formed the Ceylon Planters’ Association. Its motto was ‘Agitate, agitate, agitate’.
3. On the worldwide expansion of coffee cultivation, see Pendergrast, Uncommon Grounds.
4. See Webb, Tropical Pioneers, pp. 108–116.
5. Breckenridge, The Hills of Paradise.
6. On the early years of the tea industry, see Wickremeratne, ‘The Establishment of the Tea Industry in Ceylon’, pp. 131–55.
7. Lewis (ed.), Tropical Development, particularly the editor’s introduction.
8. Peebles, ‘The Transformation of a Colonial Elite’, particularly Chapter VI, pp. 236–38. See also his Social Change in Nineteenth Century Ceylon, pp. 197–230.
9. L.R. Jayawardena, ‘The Supply of Sinhalese Labour to Ceylon Plantations’.
10. Named after the extensive hilly area in Derbyshire, England, which it was supposed to resemble.
1. On irrigation in this period, see Roberts, ‘Aspects of Ceylon’s Agrarian Economy’, pp. 146–66, and ‘Irrigation Policy in British Ceylon’, pp. 47–63.
2. Henry Ward had been one of the earliest converts to these theories. In 1836, he had served as chairman of a House of Commons Committee on colonial land which had given Wakefield a respectful hearing even though it would not commit itself to accepting his theories in their entirety.
3. Anuradhapura was visited for the first time by a British official (Thomas Ralph Backhouse, Collector of Mannar, 1820–23) in 1823, and Polonnaruva was visited by a young soldier, Lieutenant Fagan, in 1820.
4. Sessional Paper (hereafter SP) XXIV of 1878, Paper Relating to the Grain Tax, p. 10.
5. Gregory, Autobiography, p. 329.
6. Ibid., pp. 311–12.
7. See Wesumperuma, ‘The History of the Grain Tax in British Ceylon’. See also Roberts, ‘Grain Taxes in British Ceylon, 1832–1878: Problems in the Field’, pp. 809–34, and ‘Grain Tax in British Ceylon, 1832–1878: Theories, Prejudices and Controversies’, pp. 115–46.
8. Wesumperuma, ‘The Evictions Under the Paddy Tax’, pp. 131–48, and ‘Land Sales Under the Paddy Tax’, pp. 19–35.
9. Gregory MSS, Gordon’s private letter to Gregory, 2 June 1893.
10. For a discussion on this theme, see Wickremaratne, ‘Grain Consumption and Famine Conditions’, pp. 28–53.
1. Colonial Office (hereafter CO) despatches, Series 54, Vol. 291, CO 54/ 291ff/ Pakington to Anderson, 9 of 6 January 1853. Dispatches may be accessed at the Public Record office in Kew, London.
2. See SP XVIII of 1869, containing E.L. Mitford’s memoranda on serfdom, I (December 1868) and II (January 1869), and Robinson’s minute of 24 August 1869.
3. Gregory, Autobiography, pp. 309–10.
4. CO despatch 54/528, Longden to Kimberley, 15 October 1880.
5. In the railway, for instance, nearly all the locomotive drivers, nearly all the guards and all the mechanical and track engineers were recruited from Britain till the 1920s.
6. The Irrigation Department was established in 1900.
7. Stanmore MSS, Series A, Vol. IX (49207), Gordon to Havelock, 6 May 1892.
8. A curious inclusion this, for the de Soysas did not belong to the Goyigama mudaliy•r establishment unlike the others in the list.
9. CO despatch 54/625, Havelock to Chamberlain, confidential, 20 October 1895.
10. R.E. Stubbs’s minute on MacCallum to Crewe, telegram of 27 January 1911, in CO 54/741.
11. Districts were divided into chief headmen’s division (110 in all) and these in turn into 613 subdivisions under superior headmen and 4,000 or so villages under village headmen.
12. CO despatch 54/584, Gordon to Knutsfard, 426 of 31 October 1889.
13. CO despatch 54/541, Longden to Kimberley, 456 of 26 October 1882.
1. Roberts, ‘A New Marriage, An Old Dichotomy’, pp. 32–63.
2. Wickremaratne, ‘1865 and the Changes in Educational Policies’, pp. 84–93.
3. On elite formation in nineteenth-century Sri Lanka, see Roberts, ‘Problems of Social Stratification’, pp. 549–77.
4. Ferguson, Ceylon in 1883, p. 64.
5. Estate duty was first introduced in Sri Lanka in 1919 (Ordinance No. 8 of 1919). It was not in force for a few years and was reintroduced with slight modifications (Ordinance No. 1 of 1938).
6. Roberts, ‘The Rise of the Kar•vas’.
7. Spence-Hardy, The Jubilee Memorials of the Wesleyan Mission, p. 192.8.
8. K.M. Peebles, ‘The Transformation of a Colonial Elite’, pp. 185–200.
1. K.M. de Silva, ‘The Government and Religion’, pp. 187–212, particularly pp. 197–98.
2. K.M. de Silva, ‘The Government and Religion’, pp. 199ff; ‘Religion and Nationalism’, pp. 103–38; Malalgoda, Buddhism in Sinhalese Society, pp. 191–231; ‘Buddhist-Christian Confrontation in Ceylon’, pp. 171–200.
3. Olcott, Old Diary Leaves, p. 157.
4. Prothero, The White Buddhist, pp. 85–115.
5. K.M. de Silva, ‘The Government and Religion’, p. 191–93.
6. See Malalgoda, Buddhism in Sinhalese Society, and Jayasekera, ‘Social and Political Change in Ceylon’, pp. 82–7.
7. Wickremaratne, ‘Religion, Nationalism and Social Change in Ceylon’, pp. 123–50, especially pp. 137–38.
8. K.M. de Silva, ‘Religion and Nationalism’, pp. 187–212.
9. K.M. de Silva, ‘The Government and Religion’, pp. 205–07.
10. On the temperance movement see Jayasekera, ‘Social and Political Change in Ceylon’, Chapter III; V. Kumari Jayawardena, The Rise of the Labour Movement.
11. An extract from the reports of the World Missionary Congress of 1910 quoted in M.T. Price, Christian Missions and Oriental Civilisations, pp. 152–53.
12. Ibid., pp. 152–53.
13. Young and Jebanesan, The Bible Trembled, pp. 127–43.
14. On the Islamic recovery of this period, see Azeez, The West Reappraised, and Samaraweera, ‘Arabi Pasha in Ceylon’, pp. 219–27.
15. Arabi Pasha, the leader of the abortive Egyptian uprising of 1882, was exiled to Sri Lanka and spent nineteen years there (1883–1901). The Muslims of the island welcomed him with great enthusiasm. His role in Egyptian politics is reviewed in al-Sayyid, Egypt and Cromer.
16. The Muslims of Sri Lanka were, and to a large extent, are still a Tamil-speaking community.
1. On this theme, see K.M. de Silva, ‘The Legislative Council in the Nineteenth Century’, pp. 226–48.
2. Wight, The Development of the Legislative Council, p. 14.
3. See K.M. de Silva, ‘The Legislative Council in the Nineteenth Century’, p. 237.
4. Grey, The Colonial Policy of Lord John Russell’s Administration, p. 14.
5. Ibid., p. 14.
6. Digby, Representative Government; see also, An Oriental Crown Colony.
7. Selborne’s minute of 3 August 1895, in CO despatch 295/563, Broom to Ripon, 186 of 15 May 1895, quoted in Will, ‘Problems of Constitutional Reform’, pp. 693–716, see p. 714.
8. The strength of their case lay in the fact that a fairly high qualification was assumed to be essential by the British, who had not quite done away with property qualification for their own voters at home.
9. John Ferguson’s interest in constitutional reform went back at least to 1893. In his book Ceylon in 1893 he made a plea for a reform of the island’s constitution, especially for an increase in the number of unofficial representatives with some of them to be elected on the basis of a restricted franchise. This appeal drew no response from the government.
10. Daily Graphic, 10 January 1905.
11. Ceylon Standard, 14 September 1899.
12. Sarasavi Sandaresa, 28 May 1899.
13. CO despatch 54/682, Lucas’s minute on Ridgeway to Chamberlain, 241 of 17 June 1903; see also his minute on Ridgeway to Chamberlain, 8 May 1898, CO despatch 54/626.
14. This point is made in LaBrooy, ‘The Movement Towards Constitutional Reform’, p. 192 ff.
15. Ceylon Standard, 8 June 1899.
1. Obeyesekere, ‘Religious Symbolism and Political Change in Ceylon’, pp. 43–63.
2. This was especially so with regard to attitudes on monogamy, divorce and sexual morality in general.
3. Low, Lion Rampant, p. 114.
4. See Gunawardena, ‘The Reform Movement and Political Organisations in Ceylon’, pp. 14–73.
5. Ibid.
6. For discussion on these points, see Jayasekera, ‘Social and Political Change in Ceylon’, Chapter III.
7. Relations between the theosophists and the indigenous Buddhist leadership had never been consistently friendly even in the late nineteenth century. See Malalgoda, Buddhism in Sinhalese Society, pp. 250–55.
8. See de Mel, ‘Reform of the Ceylon Legislative Council’, pp. 32–38; see also SP II of 1910, Despatches Relating to the Constitution of the Ceylon Legislative Council, Crewe to Officer Administering Ceylon Government, 9 February 1909, enclosing memorandum by James Pieris, 12 December 1908.
9. SP II of 1910, MacCallum’s despatch to the Earl of Crewe, 346 of 26 May 1909.
10. K.M. de Silva, ‘The Reform and Nationalist Movements in the Early Twentieth Century’, pp. 381–95.
11. The effective peak period of the riots was 28 May–5 June 1915. For discussion on the riots of 1915 and their historical significance, see Blackton, ‘The 1915 Riots in Ceylon’, pp. 219–66; and Robert (ed.), A Symposium on the 1915 Communal Riots. There is a more comprehensive review of these events in Jayasekera, ‘Social and Political Change in Ceylon’, pp. 247–424.
12. When the First World War broke out, Dharmapala was in Calcutta. He was accused of being engaged in intrigues with disaffected Indians—the close ties between him and the Bengali nationalists did not pass unnoticed by the police—and the Sri Lanka government refused to let him return home. He was not allowed back till 1920.
13. See Roberts, ‘Labour and the Politics of Labour’, pp. 179–208, for a very perceptive and comprehensively researched study of this problem.
14. He was elected to the ‘Educated Ceylonese’ constituency in a contest with Dr Marcus Fernando in 1911.
15. See Fernando, ‘The Post-Riots Campaign for Justice’, pp. 255–66.
16. On the formation of the Ceylon National Congress, see K.M. de Silva, ‘The Formation and Character of the Ceylon National Congress’, pp. 70–102.
17. Article I of the constitution of the Ceylon National Congress.
1. It had been in fact a major factor in the celebrated contest for the ‘Educated Ceylonese’ seat in 1911 between Ramanathan and Dr Marcus Fernando.
2. For discussions on this, see K.M. de Silva, ‘The Ceylon National Congress in Disarray I’, pp. 97–117, and ‘The Ceylon National Congress in Disarray, II’, pp. 16–35.
3. For a detailed discussion on Manning’s relations with the Kandyans, see Ariyaratne, ‘Communal Conflict in Ceylon Politics’, pp. 70–75, 92–110.
4. Manning candidly stated that he had encouraged the Kandyans to go to London to make representations and the Kandyan delegation in their evidence before Milner confirmed this. See K.M. de Silva, ‘The Ceylon National Congress in Disarray I’, pp. 99–100.
5. For discussions on this, see K.M. de Silva, ‘The Formation and Character of the Ceylon National Congress’, p. 93ff.
6. See K.M. de Silva, ‘The Ceylon National Congress in Disarray I’, p. 114.
7. See Ceylon Morning Leader, 28 October 1916.
8. For Manning’s adroit handling of this issue, see K.M. de Silva, ‘The Ceylon National Congress in Disarray, II’, pp. 16–35.
9. Ceylon Independent, editorial of 13 November 1924.
10. Ceylon Independent, 28 February 1925.
11. See Ceylon Independent, 7 December 1925, 31 January 1927, 17 November 1927.
12. See a series of six articles by S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike on federation in the Ceylon Morning Leader, 19 May to 30 June 1926. The federal structure he outlined was based on the existing provincial administrative divisions in the country and was more elaborate than the three units the Kandyans had in mind.
13. On the mah•jana sabh•s and their role in the politics of this period, see Gunawardena, ‘The Reform Movement and Political Organisation in Ceylon’, pp. 74–156.
14. F.R. Senanayake and D.B. Jayatilaka were the lay leaders of the Buddhist movement at this time.
15. For a comprehensive study of Goonesinha’s impact on the politics of the 1920s, see V. Kumari Jayawardena, The Rise of the Labour Movement in Ceylon, pp. 191–310. See also Roberts, ‘Fissures and Solidarities’, pp. 1–31, and ‘Labour and the Politics of Labour’, pp. 179–208.
16. On 24–25 April 1919, the Revd A.G. Fraser, the dynamic principal of Trinity College, Kandy, had made what was in effect the first call for manhood suffrage. This was an article in the Times of Ceylon making out a case for responsible government for Sri Lanka (he was struck by the ‘moderation of the proposals of the Ceylonese Reformers’) in the course of which he argued that an essential prelude was ‘to have a broad franchise. Personally I would like to see manhood suffrage.’
17. Arunachalam was, in fact, endorsing Fraser’s view on this occasion.
1. Lewis (ed.), Tropical Development. See the editor’s introductory essay.
2. On Sri Lanka’s plantation industry in the early twentieth century, see L.A. Wickremaratne, ‘Economic Development in the Plantation Sector’, pp. 428–45.
3. For a discussion on these problems in greater detail, see Samaraweera, ‘Land Policy and Peasant Colonisation’, pp. 446–60.
4. See Clifford, Some Reflections on the Ceylon Land Question, p. 27 for an authoritative statement of this view.
5. Ibid., p. 23.
6. Ibid., p. 2.
7. One notable feature in the pattern of population growth in the early twentieth century was that migration increase (through Indian plantation labour) was not an important factor in it.
8. Another section recruited from India consisted of the ‘coal coolies’ in the port (the coal wharves of Mutwal in Colombo), who handled loads heavier than the Sinhalese were inclined to shoulder—quite apart from the griminess, they regarded such work with distaste. The coal wharf in due course forced the elite Anglican secondary school situated there—St Thomas’ College—to seek another and more salubrious site in Mount Lavinia.
9. Roberts, ‘Fissures and Solidarities’, pp. 1–31, and ‘Labour and the Politics of Labour’, pp. 177–208.
10. See Wickremaratne, ‘Emergence of a Welfare Policy’, p. 477.
11. Goonesinha himself came to share the outlook of his more conservative contemporaries in national politics in regard to the apparently privileged position of Indian plantation workers.
12. See Jayaweera, ‘Education Policy in the Early Twentieth Century’, pp. 461–75.
13. In 1900, the overall rate of literacy in the island was 21.7 per cent; by 1921, it had reached 34.2 per cent. Female literacy rose from 6.9 to 18 per cent in the same period.
14. Administration Report, Director of Public Instruction (1900), cited in R. Pieris, ‘Universities, Politics and Public Opinion’, p. 442.
15. Administration Report, Director of Public Instruction (1903), quoted in R. Pieris, ‘Universities, Politics and Public Opinion’, p. 443.
16. On the establishment of the University of Ceylon, see the authoritative article by Jennings (its first Vice-Chancellor), ‘The Foundation of the University of Ceylon’, pp. 147–67.
1. CO despatch 537/692, Clifford to Amery, secret despatch of 20 November 1926.
2. Ibid., W. Ormsby-Gore’s minute of 28 February 1927.
3. CO despatch 54/889, file 53266, letter of W.L. Murphy (for colonial secretary, Ceylon), 29 April 1927, to E.W. Perera, president, Ceylon National Congress.
4. Marcus Fernando, Donald Obeysekera and Tudor Rajapakse were among its leading lights.
5. On the Kandyan attitudes of this period, see Wickremaratne, ‘Kandyans and Nationalism’, pp. 49–68.
6. Kandyan National Assembly, The Rights and Claims of the Kandyan People p. 37.
7. Ibid., p. 34.
8. Wight, The Development of the Legislative Council, p. 94.
9. Ibid., p. 95.
10. Donoughmore Report, pp. 18–22.
11. Donoughmore Report, pp. 99–100.
12. CO despatch 51/900, file 73230/10, T.B. Jayah’s memorandum of 27 July 1930.
13. There was for some time considerable doubt about the outcome of the vote in the Legislative Council. The Ceylon government and the Colonial Office were under great pressure from two sources—A.E. Goonesinha and the Unionist Association—to have the governor use the official bloc to carry the Donoughmore proposals through the Legislative Council. But the governor was firmly opposed to this and was supported in this by the Colonial Office.
14. Drummond Shiels came to the Colonial Office on 1 December 1929 and served in this capacity till the formation of Ramsay MacDonald’s National Government on 31 August 1931 when he went into Opposition. For a brief period from 11 June 1929 to 30 November 1929 he had been undersecretary at the India Office.
15. Bandaranaike, The Handbook of the Ceylon National Congress, p. 814.
16. CO despatch 54/911, file 93011, Thomson to Cunliffe-Lister, confidential despatch of 24 May 1932.
17. See particularly the Liberal Gazette (an organ of the All-Ceylon Liberal League), Vol. I, Nos 1–3, December 1931.
18. On the Jaffna boycott see Russell, ‘The Ceylon Tamils Under the Donoughmore Constitution’, pp. 57–80. A revised version of this thesis was published with the title Communal Politics Under the Donoughmore Constitutions, 1931–1947. It contains the substance of the material on the ‘50–50’ campaign and remains the definitive study of this issue.
19. See, for instance, the editorial in the Ceylon Daily News, 5 May 1931; also Ceylon Independent, 12 May 1931 and Ceylon Daily News, 13, 18, 23 and 26 May 1931.
20. Ceylon Daily News, 7 May 1931.
21. On the Jaffna boycott, see Russell, ‘The Dance of the Turkey-Cock’, pp. 47–67.
22. CO despatch 54/916, file 14233, H.R. Cowell’s minute of 30 May 1933.
1. Chapter 35.
2. Meyer, ‘L’impact de la dépression des années 1930’, pp. 31–66.
3. CO despatch 54/916, file 14264/2, memorandum of the Board of Ministers to Thomson, 29 July 1933.
4. CO despatch 54/960, file 34227/2, Cunliffe-Lister’s secret despatch to Stubbs, 14 December 1934.
5. On the formation of the LSSP, see Lerski, Origins of Trotskyism. See also Leslie Gunawardana, A Short History of the Lanka Sama Samaja Party, and L. Jayawardena, ‘Origins of the Left Movement in Ceylon’, pp. 195–221.
6. See Chapter 35, this volume.
7. SP XI of 1937.
8. These powers should have lapsed with the termination of hostilities in 1919, but they were renewed in 1924 by a secret despatch from L.S. Amery to Manning of 10 November 1924 (CO despatch 54/872).
9. On the Bracegirdle question despatch, see SP XVIII of 1938. For the relative official correspondence, see CO despatch 54/948, files 55878 and 55878/1.
10. On the constitutional questions at issue, the best source is Governor Caldecott’s secret minute of 26 October 1937 in CO despatch 54/948, file 55878.
11. CO despatch 54/943, file 55541, H.R. Cowell’s minute of 31 August 1937.
12. Ibid.
13. SP XXVII of 1938, pp. 3–16.
14. Ibid., pp. 5–6, particularly paragraphs 13–15.
15. For the Mool Oya incident, see SP XV of 1940; for discussion on its constitutional implications see Namasivayam, The Legislatures of Ceylon, pp. 35–36, 85, 106 and 127. The incident arose out of the shooting of a plantation worker—an Indian—by a policeman, one of a small ‘force’ sent to quell a disturbance at Mool Oya Estate in Hevaheta near Kandy.
16. On the reorganisation of the Congress, see particularly the manuscript minutes of the executive committee of the Ceylon National Congress, 27 January 1940 and 25 July 1940.
17. Times of Ceylon, 30 December 1941.
18. In December 1938 it was estimated that apart from Bandaranaike, two other members of the Board of Ministers, C.W.W. Kannangara and J.L. Kotalawala, and thirteen members of the State Council belonged to the Sinhala Mah• Sabh• (see The Times, London, 10 December 1938).
1. See Chapter 37, this volume.
2. On the transfer of power in Sri Lanka, see K.M. de Silva (ed.), Sri Lanka in British Documents. Apart from the editor’s Introduction in Part I, the volumes contain selected documents.
3. CO despatch 54/980, 580/5/1 No. 53, Caldecott’s ‘personal and secret’ despatches to Oliver Stanley, Secretary of State for the Colonies, 27 January 1943 and CO despatch 54/580/5/1 No. 57, 17 February 1943.
4. CO despatch 54/982/6 No. 89, Stanley, secret cabinet paper on ‘The Ceylon Constitution’, WP (43) 129 of 27 March 1943.
5. From 1942, the Communist Party followed a policy of close association with the Ceylon National Congress as the ‘official’ nationalist party on the island. In 1943, the communists working through the Congress branch organizations urged the rejection of the declaration of May 1943 and advocated instead a demand for the attainment of independence without the intervening stage envisaged in that declaration.
They had the sympathy and support of the great bulk of the younger Congressmen, who succeeded at the annual sessions of December 1943 in changing the provision in the Congress constitution which forbade political parties to join the Congress and admitted the Communist Party to membership. The old guard of Congress leaders were greatly agitated at the admission of the communists to membership and D.S. Senanayake resigned in protest.
6. SP XVII of 1943.
7. His principal adviser on constitutional affairs was W.I. (later Sir Ivor) Jennings, then vice chancellor of the University of Ceylon.
8. SP XIV of 1944.
9. See WO 203/5412 Mountbatten’s telegram No. SAC 2636 of 22 May 1944 (marked ‘top secret’) to the Chiefs of Staff, CO despatch 54/986, file 55541/5, War Cabinet 77(44), conclusions of meeting of 13 June 1944.
10. In September 1944, the Ceylon National Congress, rejecting the July 1944 declaration, came out in support of an all-party conference and resolved to boycott the Soulbury Commission.
11. CO despatch 54/986, file 5554/5 ‘secret’, cabinet meeting 27(45), 3 September 1945.
12. CO 54/986, file 55541/5, ‘secret’, Cabinet C(45)3, memorandum by the Secretary of State for the Colonies, subtitled ‘Ceylon Constitution’, dated 12 October 1945. This document was prepared for the Cabinet Colonial Affairs Committee. See K.M. de Silva (ed.), Towards Independence, pp. 113–14.
13. Senanayake’s report to the Board of Ministers, on his discussions with the Secretary of State for the Colonies, 9 October 1945. A copy of this paper is available in the Bernard Aluvihara manuscript at the University of Peradeniya.
14. The minutes of the discussions he had with Hall and with the Colonial Office officials are in CO despatch 54/986, file 55541/5.
15. Senanayake’s report to the Board of Ministers, 9 October 1945.
16. Ranasinha, Memories and Musings, pp. 187–232; see particularly p. 230.
17. CO despatch 54/986, file 55541/5, minutes of Cabinet Colonial Affairs Committee, 15 October C(45) and minutes of cabinet meeting of 26 October (CM[45]46) and 29 October (GEN 99/1st meeting).
18. CO despatch 54/986, file 55541/5, secret and personal telegram from Monck-Mason-Moore to Hall, 17 October 1945.
19. CO despatch 54/986, file 55541/5, minutes of cabinet meeting of 29 October 1945.
20. For these negotiations, see Jeffries, O.E.G.: A Biography of Oliver Ernest Goonetilleke, pp. 65–97. See also Duncan Hall, Commonwealth, pp. 801–10.
1. For a discussion on this, see Wickremaratne, ‘Economic Development in the Plantation Sector’, pp. 428–45.
2. See Das Gupta, A Short Economic Survey of Ceylon, and Indraratna, The Ceylon Economy. Neither of these is a comprehensive or inspiring work but they are still all we have. The reader could also consult Oliver’s monograph, Economic Opinion and Policy in Ceylon.
3. Rubber prices had increased by 66.6 per cent over those of 1935 and the volume of exports rose by 30 per cent in the same period.
4. For further discussion on this, see Samaraweera, ‘Land Policy and Peasant Colonisation’, pp. 446–60.
5. Samaraweera, ‘Land as “Patrimony”’, pp. 341–62.
6. The free services available to them were now extended through government departments concerned with land and agriculture while marketing facilities were provided through a government department established for this purpose, the Marketing Department. Equally important was the provision of communal buildings, hospitals and schools.
7. The tapping of rubber trees for latex was generally a carefully controlled exercise. Under ‘slaughter-tapping,’ these controls were eliminated.
8. Das Gupta, A Short Economic Survey of Ceylon, p. 65; Indraratna, The Ceylon Economy, pp. 34–37.
9. ‘Free’ education was, in fact, less revolutionary than both its advocates and its critics thought it was. None of the state schools teaching in the local languages charged fees. All that happened was that this principle was extended from 1945 to fee-levying English secondary schools.
10. See his speech in Hansard (State Council), 13 July 1944, col. 1227.
11. Jayewardene’s speech in Hansard (State Council), 24 January 1945, col. 492.
12. Kannangara was defeated at the general elections to the new parliament and the new minister of education extended the deadline beyond this date. Nevertheless, the vast majority of schools opted to join the ‘free education’ scheme.
13. Indraratna, The Ceylon Economy, p. 38.
14. Ibid., p. 36.
15. The Defence Regulations and the Avoidance of Strikes and Lockouts Act had severely curbed the activities of the trade unions. The communists replaced the banned LSSP as the chief political influence on the working class in Colombo and its periphery, but although they helped organize several trade unions, they were not inclined to encourage or support strike action
16. Earlier prices had been revised regularly in response to costs of imports.
1. Sarachchandra, ‘Sinhala Language and Literature’, pp. 343–55.
2. Ibid., pp.345–46.
3. Indrapala, ‘Tamil Language and Literature’, pp. 356–57.
4. Sarachchandra, ‘Sinhala Language and Literature’, pp. 349–50.
5. See Sarachchandra, Modern Sinhalese Fiction and The Sinhalese Novel.
6. Sarachchandra, The Folk Drama of Ceylon.
7. Dharmadasa, ‘Drama, Film and Music’, pp. 454–60.
1. See Campbell-Johnson, Mission with Mountbatten; Moon, Divide and Quit; and Tuker, While Memory Serves.
2. Among the objectives of this demarcation was to provide weightage in representation to the backward and sparsely populated areas in some of which minority groups—Tamils and Muslims—were concentrated. The voting strength in the constituencies varied from province to province and within provinces to the point where the resulting distortions appeared to vitiate the principle of one man, one vote.
3. For the background to this, see Wriggins, Ceylon: Dilemmas of a New Nation.
4. See K.M. de Silva, ‘Nationalism and its Impact’, pp. 62–72.
5. On the Eksath Bhikkhu Peramuna, see Wriggins, Ceylon: Dilemmas of a New Nation; and Smith (ed.), South Asian Politics and Religion, especially pp. 453–88.
6. See Woodward, The Growth of a Party System, and his article, ‘The Party System in Comparative Perspective’, pp. 144–53.
7. Cited in Woodward, ‘The Party System in Comparative Perspective’, p. 146.
8. Das Gupta, A Short Economic Survey of Ceylon, p. 9.
9. Quoted in Oliver, Economic Opinion and Policy in Ceylon, p. 50.
10. W.I. Jennings, The Economy of Ceylon, p. 40.
11. See Snodgrass, Ceylon: An Export Economy, and his article, ‘Sri Lanka’s Economic Development’, pp. 119–25.
12. W.I. Jennings, The Economy of Ceylon, p. 4; Wilson, ‘Sri Lanka’s Foreign Policy’, p. 57.
13. Wilson, ‘Sri Lanka’s Foreign Policy’, p. 57.
1. The standard work on this theme is Wriggins, Ceylon: Dilemmas of a New Nation.
2. Section 29(2)(b) and (c) of the Soulbury Constitution provided that no law enacted by parliament could ‘(b) make persons of any community or religion liable to disabilities or restrictions to which persons of other communities or religions are not made liable; or (c) confer on persons of any community or religion, any privilege or advantage which is not conferred on persons of other communities or religions....’
3. In the 1940s, as minister of local government, Bandaranaike had advocated the establishment of a system of provincial councils as the apex of the local government system. But the legislation required for this purpose was never prepared.
4. W. Dahanayake.
5. See Dharmadasa, ‘Literary Activity in the Indigenous Languages’, pp. 434–46.
6. Wilson, ‘Sri Lanka’s Foreign Policy’, p. 53.
7. On the economic policies of this period, see Snodgrass, Ceylon.
8. The schools belonging to the Buddhist Theosophical Society (BTS) were also affected, but this was not regarded as any great hardship. An attempt by a faction within the BTS to retain control of some of the more prestigious schools as independent private schools was easily squashed by a threat of a strike by teachers and students in those schools.
9. See, Jayasinghe, The Indo-Ceylon Problem, particularly pp. 205–93.
10. Quasis presided over a system of domestic relations courts for the Muslims. They had exclusive jurisdiction in respect of marriage and divorce.
11. This amendment provided for the termination of aid to countries which paid no compensation for property taken over from American companies.
12. For a discussion on this, see Snodgrass, Ceylon. See also his article ‘Sri Lanka, Economic Development during Twenty-Five Years of Independence’.
13. The oil companies were limited thereafter to the supply of bunkers to ships and aviation fuel at airports. These functions too were nationalized in 1970.
14. Jiggins, ‘Dismantling Welfarism in Sri Lanka’, pp. 84–104. See also Jayawardena, ‘Sri Lanka’, pp. 273–79.
15. Jiggins, ‘Dismantling Welfarism’, p. 90.
16. More in terms of seats in parliament than votes in the country.
17. On the insurrection, see Blackton, ‘The Ceylon Insurgency’, pp. 4–7; Halliday, ‘The Ceylonese Insurrection’, pp. 55–91; Kearney and Jiggins, ‘The Ceylon Insurrection’, pp. 40–65.
18. Jiggins, ‘Dismantling Welfarism’. See also Mervyn de Silva, ‘Sri Lanka: The End of Welfare Politics’, pp. 91–109.
19. On the 1972 constitution, see Wilson, Politics in Sri Lanka, Chapter V, pp. 189–225. See also K.M. de Silva, ‘The Constitution and Constitutional Reform’, pp. 312–29.
20. On the political situation in Sri Lanka at this time, see Saul Rose, ‘Sri Lanka at the Turning Point’, pp. 411–22.
21. See Samaraweera, ‘The Role of the Bureaucracy’, pp. 31–39, and ‘The Administration and Judicial System’, pp. 86–107.
22. The CWC’s ties with the TULF were never particularly strong, and by the last quarter of 1976 there was increasing evidence of a conflict of interests between them. The crux of the matter was that the CWC saw no advantage to its members from the ‘separate’ Tamil state which the other sections of the TULF were advocating.
23. The most comprehensive and objective study of this problem is C.R. de Silva, ‘Weightage in University Admissions’, pp. 152–78.
24. No attempt was made by Mrs Bandaranaike to revive the scheme of a separate electoral register for them.
25. The advocates of this move were clearly influenced by developments in India; they called on the Sri Lanka prime minister to emulate her Indian counterpart who had secured parliamentary approval of a postponement of the general elections scheduled for 1976.
26. These negotiations never made much progress in the way of a settlement of the main points of division between the government and the TULF. They had, in fact, collapsed before the TULF leader fell seriously ill in March 1977. He died in April 1977.
1. On the general election of 1977, see Samaraweera, ‘Sri Lanka’s 1977 General Election’, pp. 1195–206; Russell, ‘Sri Lanka’s Election Turning Point’, pp. 79–97.
2. Among the first such was a change in the mechanics of securing admission to the universities. The change was announced almost immediately after the new government took office, and well before the outbreak of the communal riots.
3. On the new constitution see CJHSS, 7(2), June–December 1977, a special issue ‘A Tale of Three Constitutions, 1946–48, 1972 and 1978’.
4. Those convicted under the terms of the Criminal Justice Commissions Law were released from jail, or their fines and other penalties were quashed.
5. This was later reduced to a simple majority.
6. The JVP insurgency of 1971 is reviewed in Alles, Insurgency 1971. See also G.H. Peiris’s article ‘Insurrection and Youth Unrest in Sri Lanka’, pp. 165–200.
7. In the Tamil areas of the Eastern Province the UNP pushed the TULF to second place.
8. For a very perceptive study of the Tamil separatist groups and the early years of the LTTE, see Narayan Swamy, Tigers of Sri Lanka; see also O’Ballance, The Cyanide War.
9. See Kelegama, Economic Development in Sri Lanka, p. 28.
10. On the Indian intervention in Sri Lanka, see K.M. de Silva, Regional Powers and Small State Security; Muni, Pangs of Proximity; Bullion, India, Sri Lanka and the Tamil Crisis; Sankaran, Postcolonial Insecurities.
11. Sisson and Rose, War and Secession.
12. On the JVP’s second insurrection, the best study is Chandraprema, Sri Lanka: The Years of Terror.
13. On J.R. Jayewardene’s last months in office, see K.M. de Silva and Wriggins, J.R. Jayewardene of Sri Lanka, Chapters 34–37.
1. As minister of national security he had led the campaign against the Tamil separatist forces in the 1980s.
2. See K.M. de Silva and Peiris (eds), Pursuit of Peace in Sri Lanka.
3. On these negotiations, see K.M. de Silva, ‘Sri Lanka’s Prolonged Ethnic Conflict’, pp. 437–69.
4. On the LTTE and its current policies and objectives, see K.M. de Silva, ‘Separatism and Political Violence’, pp. 379–430.
5. See Kaarthikeyan and Raju, The Rajiv Gandhi Assassination.
6. K.M. de Silva, ‘Sri Lanka’s Prolonged Ethnic Conflict’, pp. 437–69.
* He was head of government while Mrs Kumaratunga remained executive president