The Polonnaruwa Kingdom - VII

The Polonnaruwa Kingdom - VII

Contiued with part six   here to go previous one

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 vihara (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 devale 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 in date and more ornate is Siva devale No. I. Both are smaller one might even say miniature versions of the towering Coja architecture of South India.

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