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The Satmahalprasada, a stupa with an unusual pyramid-like form in seven levels or stories, is much more of an enigma. Was this monument yet another derived from an Indian prototype or an outstanding example of South East Asian Cambodian and Burmese influence on Sri Lankan architecture? The latter seems more likely because of the peculiar shape of this monument and in view of the very close religious ties at this time between Sri Lanka and the Buddhist countries of South East Asia. As at Anuradhapura, few secular buildings have survived in Polonnaruva. Of Parakramabahu's palace, only the foundations remain today, but Nisanka Malla's audience hall is in a better state of preservation.
As for painting, what is now preserved is a very small fraction of the work executed by the artists of the Polonnaruva kingdom. Of the secular paintings, nothing has survived, although the evidence suggests that walls of palaces like those of shrines were decorated with paintings. Those on religious edifices have fared slightly better. The Laiikatilaka bears traces of paintings on its walls, exterior as well as interior. The walls of the Tivanka pratimaghara (erroneously called the Demalamahasaya) carry more paintings than any other monument at Polonnaruva or indeed in the island, but the date of these paintings is a matter of conjecture, for though this shrine was built in the reign of Parakramabahu I, it has evidently been renovated and possibly altered at a later date.
These paintings are the work of artists who had centuries of tradition behind them, and who belonged to a school which, in its heyday, had ramifications throughout the subcontinent of India and beyond it. The famous cave paintings of Ajanta and Bagh are its most mature products. By the twelfth century, this artistic tradition was almost extinct in India, but the fragmentary remains of the Polonnaruva paintings afford proof that it had been preserved in Sri Lanka long after it had lost its vitality in the land of its origin. Nevertheless, like the earlier Slgiri paintings, these latter are distinctly provincial in comparison with the Indian prototype.
Indeed, all the later work in Polonnaruva, whether in art or architecture, appears archaic if not atavistic, the result very probably of a conscious effort at reviving and imitating the artistic traditions of the Anuradhapura kingdom. The moonstones of Polonnaruva are inferior to those of Anuradhapura in vitality and aesthetic appeal, just as the baths which adorned the palaces and monasteries were smaller in size and, with the single exception of the exquisite lotus bath, less elegant in design. The transformation of Polonnaruva into a gracious cosmopolitan city was the work of three kings Vijayabahu I, Parakramabahu I and Nissarika Malla and this development could be measured in generations if not decades, and not, as in the case of the cognate process in Anuradhapura, in centuries. Polonnaruva had a smaller area than Anuradhapura, but its compactness was conducive to a remarkable symmetry in the location of its major edifices, all of them like so many links in some gigantic creation of a celestial jeweler who used the Parakrama Samudra to the best possible advantage to set them off.
The comparatively short period in which the architecture and sculptural splendors of Polonnaruva were created is no doubt testimony to the dynamism and creativity of its rulers and people. But it had its somber side as well, for in retrospect the activity seems febrile, and this conspicuous investment in monuments must have impaired the economic strength of the kingdom and contributed greatly to the rapid decline that set in after the reign of Nissarika Malla.
Although trade, external as well as internal, had grown substantially in Sri Lanka during the Polonnaruva era, it was still very much in the shadow of domestic agriculture, which continued to be the predomi¬nant economic activity of the kingdom. And the role of money in the economy appears to have been, as in the days of the Anuradhapura kingdom, of merely peripheral significance.
Religion and culture
The inevitable result of the Cola conquest was that Hindu Brahmanical and Saiva religious practices, Dravidian art and architecture, and the Tamil language itself became overwhelmingly powerful in their intrusive impact on the religion and culture of Sri Lanka. The period of the South Indian invasions of the Anuradhapura kingdom in the ninth and tenth centuries coincided with the decline of Buddhism in India and the collapse of important centers of Buddhist learning as a result of Muslim invasions. These processes proved to be irreversible. South Indian influence on Sri Lanka thereafter became exclusively Hindu in content. It is against this background that the recovery of Buddhism under the Polonnaruva kings needs to be reviewed. The most substantial contributions came from Vijayabahu I and Parakramabahu I. The unification of the sangha in the latter’s reign was one of the most significant events in the history of Sinhalese Buddhism. Traditionally this has been viewed in terms of the triumph of the Mahavihara, and the discomfiture if not suppression of the Abhayagiri and Jetavana nikdyas. But recent research has shown this to be quite inaccurate. The loss of property by the monasteries during the period of Coja rule, and again in the interregnum between Vijayabahu I and the accession of Parakramabahu I had had a deleterious effect upon all the nikdyas. Their disintegration had in fact led to a new grouping of the sangha under eight miles or fraternities. Parakramabahu I brought these eight fraternities together under a common leadership—a process of unification which was at once much more and much less than imposing the authority of the Mahavihara over the other two nikdyas. It did not end sectarian competition but appears to have had a tonic effect on both evangelistic and scholarly activity.
The resuscitator zeal of these two monarchs, in particular, demonstrated afresh the remarkable resilience of Sri Lankan Buddhism. Sinhalese bhikkhus maintained contacts with distant centers of Buddhism like Nepal and Tibet; they also made vigorous but unsuccessful attempts to spread their teachings in Bengal, apart from engaging in spirited disputes with their Theravadin colleagues in South India on questions relating to the interpretation of the canon. It was South- East Asia, however, that was most receptive to their teachings, and the expansion of Sinhalese Theravada Buddhism in that region was an important trend in its cultural history during this period. Two other developments in Sri Lankan Buddhism need mention. First, there was the increasing popularity of Ararmavdsins, the forest-dwelling monks who, in the latter part of this period, gained prominence in scholarly activities and took the lead in reformist movements; there was, secondly, the increasing involvement of monasteries in secular activity, which stemmed mainly from the large land grants donated to the sangha and the transfer of administrative authority over the temporalities to the monasteries, a significant extension of the privileges normally implied in the immunities granted with such donations of land.
One of the distinctive features of the literature of the Polonnaruva period was the continued vitality of Pali as the language of Sinhalese Buddhism. The tradition was still very much in favor of writing in Pali rather than Sinhalese. The Pali works of this period were mainly expositions or summaries of works of the Pali canon. There were also the likes explaining and supplementing the commentaries composed in the Anuradhapura era. The Ddfhavarhsa3 a history of the tooth relic was one of the more notable literary contributions in the Pali language. Its author, Mahanama, is also credited with the first part of the Culavamsa, the continuation of the Mahavamsa. The Pali literature of this period bears the impression of the strong tonic effect of Sanskrit, which had a no less significant influence on contemporary Sinhalese writing. The bulk of the Sinhalese works of this period are glossaries and translations from the Pali canon. There were also two prose works by a thirteenth-century author, Gurulugomi, the Amdvatura and the Dharmapradipikava, of which the former was more noteworthy; and two poems (of the late twelfth and early thirteenth century), the Sasadavata and the Muvadevadavata, both based on Jataka stories, and both greatly influenced by the Sanskrit works of Kalidasa and Kumaradasa.
The very little of the literature of the Polonnaruva era that has survived is not exceptionally distinguished; indeed all of it shares the flaws of the literature of the Anuradhapura period without its compensating virtues, and they do not compare, in creativity or originality, with the writings of the succeeding period of Sri Lanka's history. In architecture and sculpture, the performance was memorable. the contribution was the construction of the Temple of the Tooth (now represented by the ruin called the Atadage). There was a considerable setback to this artistic recovery in the instability and turmoil that followed his death. With Parakramabahu I the great period of artistic activity of Polonnaruva began and was continued under Nissanka Malla during the brief decade (i 187-96) of order and stability which his reign represented and during which Polonnaruva reached the zenith of its development as a capital city. The Gal Vihara sculptures (in the reign of Parakramabahu I) are the glory of Polonnaruva and the summit of its artistic achievement. The four great statues of the Buddha which comprise this complex, representing the three main positions the seated, the standing and the recumbent, are cut in a row from a horizontal escarpment of streaked granite. Each of these statues was originally sheltered by its own image house. The consummate skill with which the peace of the enlightenment has been depicted, in an extraordinarily successful blend of serenity and strength, has seldom been equalled by any other Buddha image in Sri Lanka. Of similar nobility of conception, and magnitude is the colossal figure (of a sage, as some scholars would have it, or a monarch, as others insist) overlooking the bund of the Topa viva. The dignity, puissance and self reliance of the figure have been rendered with amazing economy and restraint.
Of the architectural monuments attributed to the reign of NisSanka Malla the most unforgettable is the collection of temples and viharas in the so-called Great Quadrangle, which has been described as among the 'most beautiful and satisfyingly proportioned buildings in the entire Indian world'. The Nissanka lata mantfapaya is a unique type of Sinhalese architectural monument: a cluster of granite columns shaped like lotus stems with capitals in the form of opening buds, within a raised platform, all contributing to a general effect 'of extreme chastity and Baroque fancy [unsurpassed] in any Indian shrine'. The Hatadage was certainly begun and completed during his reign. The embellishments on the pillars of the Atadage have no rival in the decorative art of the Sinhalese, and stand comparison with the best examples of such work elsewhere. The beautiful vatadage, 'one of the loveliest examples of Sinhalese architecture', has its name associated
The vatadagi, the most remarkable architectural monument to be seen at Polonnaruva, is of the same type as the circular shrines enclosing stupas at the Thuparama and Lankarama at Anuradhapura. This architectural type is a development from the circular cetiyaghara of India. The vatadage is the most developed example of this type. with Nisanka Malla but it is doubtful if he did much more than construct its outer porch. The Satmahalprasada and the stupendous Rankot vihdra (or, to give its ancient name, the Ruvanvali), with the frontispieces and chapels at its base, were the work of Nissanka Malla.
Although there is a striking continuity between the art and architecture of Polonnaruva and that of Anuradhapura, the distinctive feature of Polonnaruva's architectural remains is the mingling of Buddhist and Hindu decorative elements, a fusion which extended far beyond the mere stylistic plagiarism of Hindu and Dravidian forms. It reflected the powerful influence of Mahayanism and Hinduism in the lives of the people.
Siva device No. 2 is the earliest in date of all the monuments now preserved in Polonnaruva. Built entirely of stone, it dates from the time of Cola rule and is a representative example of Dravidian architecture at its best. Later to date and more ornate is Siva device No. I. Both are smaller one might even say miniature versions of the towering Coja architecture of South India.
The principal source of the king’s revenue in the Polonnaruva kingdom was the land-tax with taxes on paddy contributing the major portion; there were smaller yields from levies on other crops. There was also the diyadada (the equivalent of the diyadedum of the Anuradhapura kingdom), the tax on the use of water from irrigation channels which no doubt yielded a very substantial income. There was, in addition, revenue from certain valuable items in the country's exchange temal trade gems, pearls, cinnamon and elephants extending from a share of the profits to monopoly rights. Thus the mining of gems seems to have been a royal monopoly, which was protected by a prohibition on permanent settlement in the gem-producing districts. Individuals were permitted to mine for gems on payment of a fee, and the mining was carried out seasonally under the supervision of royal officials, with the king enjoying prerogative rights to the more valuable gems. The pearl fishery too was a royal monopoly conducted on much the same basis. Finally, the king's own lands were also a quite notable source of income for him. These taxes were collected by a hierarchy of officials. At the base of the structure were the village authorities possibly village headmen who were entrusted with the collection of taxes due to the king from each village; these were delivered to the king’s officials during their annual tours.
The fact that these taxes were paid partly at least in grain and other agricultural produce which, being more or less perishable, could not be stored indefinitely by the officials who collected them may have been a guarantee against extortionate levies on the peasantry. A tax of one-sixth of the produce was regarded as an equitable land tax, but in practice, there was no uniformity in the rate of taxation, a flexibility which could often be to the disadvantage of the peasant. It is significant that Vijayabahu I, on his accession to the throne, should have directed his officials to adhere to custom and usage in the collection of taxes, and that Nisshanka Malla himself claims to have reduced taxes presumably because they had become burdensome. One of the notable features in the economic history of the period extending from the ninth century to the end of the Polonnaruva king¬dom was the expansion of trade within the country. The data available at present is too meagre for an analysis of the development of this trade, or indeed for a detailed description of its special characteristics, but there is evidence of the emergence of merchant 'corporations', the growth of market towns linked by well-known trade routes, and the development of a local, that is to say, regional coinage. Tolls and other levies on this trade yielded a considerable income to the state.
There was at the same time a substantial revenue from customs dues on external trade although the data we have is too scanty to compute with any precision the duties levied on the various export and import commodities. Sri Lanka was a vital link in the great trade routes between east and west, of importance in 'transit' trade due to her advantageous geographical location, and in the 'terminal' trade on account of her natural products such as gems, pearls, and timber. Apart from the traditional ports of the north and north-west of the island, and on the east coast, those of the west coast too became important in this trade. Besides, the island's numerous bays, anchorages, and roadsteads offered adequate shelter for the sailing ships of this period. Trade in the Indian Ocean at this time was dominated by the Arabs, who were among the leading and most intrepid sailors of the era. The large empires at both ends of the route the unity imposed on the Muslim world by the Caliphs and the peace enjoyed by China during the T’ang and Sung dynasties helped increase the tempo of the trade between China and the Persian Gulf. The countries of South and South East Asia lying between these two points shared in this and indeed derived a considerable profit from it. Luxury articles were the main commodities in this inter Asian and international trade and to this category belonged Sri Lanka's gems and pearls.
The competition for this Indian Ocean trade was not always peaceful. Behind the Coja expansion into South East Asia lay a determination to obtain greater control over the trade and trade routes of the Indian Ocean. Although powerful political motives spurred them on to a conquest of Sri Lanka, the Cojas were always aware of the economic advantages of this her valuable foreign trade, and her strategic position athwart the maritime trade routes of the Indian Ocean. While Sri Lanka herself seldom resorted to war in defense of her trade interests, Parakramabahu I's expedition against Burma, though somewhat exceptional, was nevertheless a significant demonstration of how commercial rivalry could undermine a long-standing alliance based on a common religious outlook. Though most of the vessels used in her external trade were generally of foreign construction, the seaworthy craft was built in Sri Lanka as well, and are known to have sailed as far as China. Perhaps some of the latter may even have been used to transport Parakramabahu I's troops to Burma.
Foreign merchants were attracted to the island because of its importance as a center of international trade. The most prominent of the merchant groups settled in Sri Lanka were the Moors, descendants of Arab traders to the island. These Arab merchants and their agents had established settlements in South India as well, as early as the tenth century. They were a dominant influence on the island’s international trade in the period of the Polonnaruva kings, a position which they retained till the early decades of the sixteenth century when the Polonnaruva kingdom itself was no more than a memory. However, the foreign trade of that kingdom was by no means a Moor monopoly. There were other foreigners living in the island for reasons of trade, and among the more interesting of these were Cambodian bird catchers. The feathers of exotic birds were an important item in international trade at this time.
The economic and social structure of the Polonnaruva kingdom, like its art and architecture, was a natural development from, if not a continuation of, those of the Anuradhapura kingdom. It was a hydraulic civilization and a caste-oriented feudal polity. Its astonishing creativity in irrigation was all the more remarkable for the brief period of time over which it was achieved, and the massive efforts at restoration which preceded any attempts at expansion. Repair and restoration, by themselves, called for a prodigious expenditure of resources. Most of this work was concentrated in the reigns of three kings, Vijayabahu I, Parakramabahu I and Nissanka Malla, the outstanding contribution being that of Parakramabahu I whose reign marked the peak of Sinhalese achievement in hydraulic engineering.
The Polonnaruva kings were the heirs to several centuries of experience in irrigation technology. But they themselves and especially Parakramabahu I made a distinctive contribution of their own in honing these techniques to cope with the special requirements of the immense irrigation projects constructed at this time. There was, for instance, the colossal size of the Parakrama Samudra (the sea of Parakrama) which, with an embankment rising to an average height of 40 feet and stretching over its entire length of 8 J miles, was by far the largest irrigation tank constructed in ancient Sri Lanka. This stupendous project incorporated two earlier tanks, the Topavava and the Dimbutuluvava. Fed from the south by the A figamailla canal, it was linked on the north-west with the Giritale tank and through it with the Alahara system. The earthworks involved in this project were unprecedented in scale, and the stonemasonry of this and other irrigation works of this period involved the handling of stone blocks of up to 10i tons in weight.
Refinement of irrigation technology was demonstrated also in the three weirs built across the Daduru Oya, the only river in the western part of the dry zone to provide anything like a perennial supply of water. The second of these diverted water to the Mahagalla reservoir (which had been built by Mahasena) and was a masterly engineering feat whose special feature was the amazing precision with which the large stone blocks of its outer walls were fitted, their joints only J inch in width.8
The Culavarhsa's account of the reign of Parakramabahu I contains an extensive catalogue of irrigation works repaired, restored, expanded or constructed in his reign. The impression of tireless devotion to this crucial aspect of governmental enterprise in Sri Lanka's hydraulic society could hardly be described as inaccurate. But it is essential to remember that it was no truer than in the Anuradhapura era that every link and every unit in this intricate irrigation network was working pari passu for any great length of time. They could not have done so, and in fact, did not. If this perspective appears somewhat to limit the achievement of that era, one must remember that this was the last major phase in the development of irrigation in ancient Sri Lanka. Nothing on this scale was attempted, much less achieved, till the second quarter of the twentieth century. And so the chronicler’s account can be seen for what it was, evocative and even poignant, for he was lamenting, in a later and more cramped era, the passing of an age of creativity, when the island's irrigation tanks were no more than stupendous ruins, but yet the proudest monuments ... of the former greatness of their country when the opulence they engendered enabled the kings to lavish untold wealth upon edifices of religion, to subsidise mercenary armies and to fit out expeditions for foreign conquest.
We turn next, and briefly, to the caste structure of Sri Lanka society under the Polonnaruva kings. Two points are of special interest. There is, first, much stronger evidence of a hierarchical arrangement of castes, though it is difficult to determine the exact or even approximate place of each caste in that structure. The segmentation of Sinhalese society into some of the numerous castes which exist today began before this period, but the process appears to have been accelerated in it. Secondly, there was increasing rigidity in the observance of caste duties, obligations and rights on the basis of custom and usage. For instance, a Tamil inscription of 1122 reveals that washermen were required to perform their customary duties to members of certain other presumably 'higher' castes, and that there would be no remission of this obligation, while a rock inscription of Vijayabahu I at Ambagamuva shows that he had constructed a special platform on Adam's Peak(Sri Padaya) below the main terrace of the 'sacred' footprint for the use of persons of 'low' caste. More significantly, there are Nissanka Malla's repeated references to, and ridicule of, the aspirations of the govikula (the goyigama caste, then as now very probably the largest caste group among the Sinhalese, though possibly not at that time the most prestigious) to kingship in Sri Lanka.
Quite clearly this was regarded as a monopoly of the kratriyas. This hardening of caste attitudes is attributed to the burgeoning influence of Hinduism on religion and society in Sri Lanka. Land tenure in the Polonnaruva kingdom was as much a multi-centered system as it was earlier, and its pattern was just as complex.11 There was a wide variety both in the number of individuals and institutions sharing land and rights accruing from land as well in their tenurial obligations. The king had definite claims over most of the land in the kingdom, but these were no obstacle to private individuals in buying and alienating land. To a much greater extent than in the Anuradhapura kingdom, the 'immunities' various concessions and privileges in regard to land granted during this period strengthened the position of the hereditary nobility.
The conferment of these immunities which were very much in vogue in this period was a special privilege of the king or someone in a position of similar authority, such as heirs apparent or regional rulers with considerable power such as those of Rohana. In general, immunities guaranteed freedom from interference by royal officers, and ensured exemption from taxation. Pamunu (or paraveni as it was called after the fourteenth century) and divel holdings were now a conspicuous part of the tenurial system, unmistakable evidence of the growing strength of feudalism, and this in a period when, paradoxically, there was a positive efflorescence of royal authority, in terms of its grandeur and majesty. As in the late Anuradhapura period, however, the most salient manifestation of feudalism lay in the immunities granted to the monasteries. These now extended beyond the conventional rights to labour and the whole or part of the revenue of the block of land or village thus granted, to the transfer of fiscal as well as administrative and judicial authority over the lands thus held. As a result, the monasteries and their functionaries came to be entrusted with much of the local administrative duties traditionally performed by the king’s officials; it would appear that some new administrative structures were developed to cope with this significant enlargement of the role of the monasteries in the social system.
The range of Sri Lanka's political and cultural links with Indian states was not limited to South India. As we have seen, the Sinhalese kingdom had very close ties with Kaliriga in the Orissa region, but surprisingly there is little or no Indian evidence bearing on this. On Sri Lanka’s ties with the Calukyas of the Deccan, some information is available. There was indeed a natural convergence of political in¬terests between Sri Lanka and the kingdoms of the Deccan, prompted by the common desire to keep the Cojas in check. An examination of the foreign relations of the island under the Polonnaruva kings reveals an excitingly new dimension: political links with South-East Asia, in particular with Burma (then known to the Sinhalese as Ramanna) and Cambodia. Because of her strategic position athwart the sea route between China and the west, there had been from the very early centuries of the Christian era trade links between the island and some of the South East Asian states and China. Very likely, religious affinity a Buddhist outlook, Theravada or Mahayanist would have strengthened ties which had developed from association in trade, but up till the eleventh century, the cohesion which comes from strong diplomatic and political ties was still lacking. In the eleventh and twelfth centuries, at a time of unusual ferment in the politics of the South East Asian region, with many kingdoms then engaged in a self-conscious search for a new identity, and reaching out for new political ties, formal political relations were established between some of these states and Sri Lanka. The Polonnaruwa rulers responded eagerly to these initiatives for they relished the new and attractive vistas in politics and trade which links with South East Asian kingdoms held out. For Vijayabahu I, engaged in a grim struggle against the Cojas, there were immediate advantages from this in the form of economic aid from Anauratha, the Burmese king. The alliance with Burma appears to have continued after the expulsion of the Cojas, and it was to Burma that Vijayabahu I turned for assistance in reorganizing the sangha in Sri Lanka, thus underlining the connection between political ties and a common commitment to Buddhism.
But just as important in the development of political relations between Sri Lanka under the Polonnaruva kings and South East Asia was the commerce of the Indian Ocean. Under Parakramabahu I, conflicting commercial interests drew Sri Lanka and Burma apart. Intent on expanding his country's stake in the maritime trade of the Indian Ocean, Parakramabahu I sought to establish close ties with the powerful Khmer kingdom of Cambodia, thus arousing the suspicions of the Burmese king Alaungsithu, who viewed this development as potentially a serious threat to Burma's own maritime trade. To protect this latter, he resorted to a policy of obstructing Sri Lanka's trade in South East Asia, resulting in strained relations between Burma and Sri Lanka, and eventually war. Parakramabahu I despatched an ex¬pedition to lower Burma. But once this indecisive encounter was over there was a speedy restoration of friendly relations between the two countries.
Between the death of Parakramabahu I and the collapse of the Polonnaruva kingdom there are only two instances of Sri Lanka rulers seeking political links or contacts with South East Asia. These were Vijayabahu II and Nissarika Malla; the first maintained friendly relations with Burma, and the latter with Cambodia as well. But Nissanka Malla's claims in this regard are a matter of some controversy. In a curious way, all these various strands which made up the politics of the island in the last days of the Polonnaruva kingdom were linked together by the only recorded South-East Asian invasion of Sri Lanka. The invasion, which occurred in 1247 when Parakramabahu II (1236-70) was the Sinhalese king ruling at Dembadeniya, was led by Chandrabhanu of Tambralinga, a petty kingdom in the Malay peninsula which had established itself as an independent state in the last days of the Sri Vijaya empire in the thirteenth century.5 Parakramabahu's forces defeated Chandrabhanu, who fled to the Jaffna kingdom, then under Magha. There he succeeded in securing the throne for himself (how he did so we do not know for certain) and was the ruler of Jaffna at the time of the Pandyan invasion.
This latter stemmed from Pandyan rivalry with the Colas, who supported Magha's regime in Sri Lanka. Indeed Magha, as the ruler of the northern kingdom, was no more than a satellite of the Cojas. When, by the middle of the thirteenth century, the Pandyas had established themselves as the dominant power in South India, they were inclined to support the Sinhalese kings against the newly established kingdom in the north of the island. Their intervention in the affairs of Sri Lanka, if more restrained in its objectives than that of the Cdjas, was however no less governed by considerations of realpolitik. They invaded Jaffna and forced Chandrabhanu to submit to Pantfya power, but at the same time, there was no inclination on their part to permit the Sinhalese to reestablish their control over Jaffna. Chandrabhanu was allowed to remain on the throne at Jaffna as a tributary of Pandya. It became evident that one of the limitations imposed on him was that there could be no disturbance of the balance of political power in the island at the expense of the Sinhalese ruler. When Chandrabhanu embarked on a second invasion of the Sinhalese kingdom, and Parakramabahu II appealed to Pandya for help, an expeditionary force was despatched to bring the Javaka ruler to a realization of the limits of his power. The combination of Pandya and Sinhalese forces won an overwhelming victory and Chandrabhanu himself was killed in the confrontation. Instead of handing over control of the Jaffna kingdom to Parakramabahu II the Pandyas preferred to install a son of Chandrabhanu as ruler of Jaffna. When he, in turn, became a threat to the Sinhalese, the latter once more sought the help of the Pandyas, who intervened with decisive effect; but Sinhalese control of the Jaffna kingdom was still equally unacceptable to the Pandyas, and so Aryacakravarti, the leader of the Pandyan army of invasion on this occasion was installed as ruler of Jaffna under their overlordship. When the Pandyan empire, in turn, collapsed as a result of Muslim inroads into South India, Jaffna became an independent kingdom under the Aryacakravartis.
Magha's rule and its aftermath are a watershed in the history of the island, marking as they did the beginning of a new political order. For one thing, Polonnaruva ceased to be the capital city after Magha's death in 1255. The heartland of the old Sinhalese kingdom and Rohana itself was abandoned. The Sinhalese kings and people, in the face of repeated invasions from South India, retreated further and further into the hills of the wet zone of the island, seeking security primarily, but also some kind of new economic base to support the truncated state they controlled.
In the meantime Tamil settlers occupied the Jaffna peninsula and much of the land between Jaffna and Anuradhapura knew as the Vanni; they were joined by Tamil members of the invading armies, often mercenaries, who chose to settle in Sri Lanka rather than return to India with the rest of their compatriots. It would appear that by the thirteenth century the Tamils too withdrew from the Vanni, and thereafter their main settlements were confined almost entirely to the Jaffna peninsula and possibly also to several scattered settlements near the Eastern seaboard. By the thirteenth century, an independent Tamil kingdom had been established with the Jaffna peninsula as its base.
Foreign relations
At the beginning of this period the Colas was still the dominant power in South India, with the Pancjyas struggling to maintain themselves as a distinct political entity. As for Sri Lanka, the predominant South Indian state sought to assert its authority over the island, or at least to influence its politics, and Sri Lanka's rulers on their part endeavoured to support the rivals of the dominant power in order to protect their own interests—in brief, they attempted to maintain a balance of power in South India. Thus, for as long as Cola was the dominant power, Sri Lanka’s alliance with the PanJyas continued. The early rulers of Polonnaruva were far too preoccupied with the internal politics of the island to pursue a dynamic foreign policy. But the situation changed when Parakramabahu had consolidated his hold on the island's affairs. His first venture in foreign affairs, the participation in what is known as the ‘war of Panqlyan succession', was the inevitable result of Sri Lanka's alignment with Pantfya. This proved to be a long drawn out involvement, beginning as it did a little before his seventeenth regnal year and dragging on till the end of his reign. While there was some initial success, the Sri Lanka armies were eventually defeated. Nevertheless, they were able to sustain a determined and prolonged resistance against the Colas, despite the latter's military superiority. Parakramabahu often succeeded in negating a Coja victory, even an overwhelming one, by diplomatic intrigue, for Pan^yan rulers who secured their throne with Coja backing subsequently turned to Parakramabahu for assistance, thus rekindling the war which appeared to have died out, as the Colas reacted by seeking to replace such a ruler with a more reliable and pliant protege. Thus Parakramabahu achieved what he set out to do, to prevent the establishment of a Coja hegemony over South India. Had the Cojas been left unopposed, they could have been a greater threat to the security of Sri Lanka than they were, and may even have endangered Parakramabahu's own position by espousing the cause of Sri Vallabha, an aspirant to the Sri Lanka throne who was living in exile in the Coja country. As it was, when Sri Vallabha did organize an invasion, it proved to be a dismal failure.
If this prolonged entanglement in South Indian politics ended in military failure and severely strained the island's economy, it nevertheless contributed substantially to the impairment of Coja power. Thus while the successors of Parakramabahu inherited a legacy of Coja hostility to Sri Lanka, the Cojas were by then on the verge of being eclipsed by their rivals, the Pandyas. The last Sri Lanka ruler to intervene in the affairs of South India was Nishanka Malla, who despatched a Sri Lanka expeditionary force to the mainland and, unlike Parakramabahu, accompanied his troops on their mission. His activities there, about which he makes ex¬aggerated claims in his inscriptions, were no more successful mili¬tarily than those of Parakramabahu's generals. By the mid-thirteenth century, the most menacing threat to the enfeebled Sinhalese kingdom came from the Pandyas, their traditional allies against the Cojas. The prolonged crisis in the Sri Lanka polity naturally attracted the Colas, but not any longer with the same frequency or effectiveness as the Pandyas who, as the predominant power in South India, now sought to establish their influence if not domination over Sri Lanka. Pantfyan princes on the Polonnaruva throne, and Pandyan intervention during the period of Magha's rule in the island, bear testimony to the persistence of the traditional pattern of the dominant power in South India seeking to establish its influence on the governance of the island.
Parakramabahu had the distinct advantage of being closely related to the royal dynasty at Polonnaruva and was therefore in a position to stake a claim to the throne. Once he captured power, his legal status as sovereign was accepted, unlike the claims of his two predecessors at Polonnaruva, Vikramabahu II and Gajabahu II. Three distinct phases in Parakramabahu's rise to power can be demarcated. The first of these was the establishment of control over Dakkhinadesa and his consecration as Mahadipada, a tide usually adopted by the heir to the Polonnaruva throne. In the second phase, the tripartite struggle between him as ruler of Dakkhinadesa and the rulers of Polonnaruva and Rohana, Parakramabahu's aim was not so much to capture Polonnaruva as to secure his own recognition as heir to the Polonnaruva throne, and this he achieved. In the harsh conflict that ensued, Parakramabahu's victory was at first by no means certain, but it ended with him very much in control over the Rajarata and Dakkhinadesa, though not of Rohana which still maintained a defiant independence. The third and longest phase began after he took control of Polonnaruva and found his position threatened by the ruler of Rohana. For Parakramabahu, intent on establishing his control over the whole island, Rohana was the last and most formidable hurdle to clear. Its ruler was quite as determined as his predecessors in the days of the Anuradhapura kings to protect Rohana's particularist interests against the central authority in the Rajarata. One of the crucial factors in Parakramabahu's success in this struggle was his capture of the Tooth and Bowl relics of the Buddha which had by now become essential to the legitimacy of royal authority in Sri Lanka.
Once the political unification of the island had been reestablished, Parakramabahu followed Vijayabahu I in keeping a tight check on separatist tendencies in the island, especially in Rohana where particularism was a deeply ingrained political tradition. Rohana did not accept its loss of autonomy without a struggle, and Parakramabahu faced a formidable rebellion there in 1160 which he put down with great severity (there was a rebellion in the Rajarata as well in 1168 and this too was ruthlessly crushed). All vestiges of its former auto¬nomy were now purposefully eliminated, and as a result, there was, in the heyday of the Polonnaruva kingdom, much less tolerance of particularism than under the Anuradhapura kings. As we shall see, the country was to pay dearly for this over-centralization of authority in Polonnaruva.
Parakramabahu I was the last of the great rulers of ancient Sri Lanka. After him, the only Polonnaruva king to rule over the whole island was Nissanka Malla, the first of the Kalinga rulers, who gave the country a brief decade of order and stability before the speedy and catastrophic break up of the hydraulic civilizations of the dry zone. The achievements of the Polonnaruva kings Vijayabahu I, Parakramabahu I and Nissanka Malla, memorable and substantial though they were, had their darker side as well. The flaw had to do with a conspicuous lack of restraint, especially in the case of Parakramabahu I. In combination with his ambitious and venturesome foreign policy, the expensive diversion of state resources into irrigation projects and public works civil and religious sapped the strength of the country and thus contributed to the sudden and complete collapse which followed so soon after his death.
At the death of Parakramabahu I, the problem of succession to the throne arose once more and was complicated by the fact that he had no sons of his own. The inevitable confusion and intrigue were cut short by the success with which Nissarika Malla (who introduced him¬self as a prince of Kalinga, chosen and trained for the succession by Parakramabahu himself) established his claims, although it was conceded that Vijayabahu II had precedence over him by virtue of seniority if not for any other reason. As the scion of a foreign dynasty, Nissanka Malla was less secure on the throne than his two illustrious predecessors. If he was not overwhelmed by the problems inherent in maintaining intact the political structures fashioned by Vijayabahu I and Parakramabahu I, two of the most masterful rulers the island had seen, his successors clearly were. With his death after a rule of nine years (how he died is not known), there was a renewal of political dissension within the kingdom complicated now by dynastic disputes.
The Kalinga dynasty maintained itself in power with the support of an influential faction within the country. But their hold on the throne was inherently precarious, and their survival owed much to the inability of the factions opposing them to come up with an aspirant to the throne with a politically viable claim, or sufficient durability once installed in power, and in desperation they raised Lilavatl, a queen of Parakramabahu I, to the throne on three occasions. The ensuing political instability inevitably attracted the attention of Cola and Pandya adventurers bent on plunder. These South Indian incursions culminated in a devastating campaign of pillage under Magha of Kalinga, from which the Sinhalese kingdom of the Rajarata never recovered.