Kurunagala
Kurunegala ( si, කුරුණෑගල, ta, குருணாகல்) is a major city in Sri Lanka. It is the capital city of the North Western Province and the Kurunegala District. Kurunegala was an ancient royal capital for 50 years, from the end of the 13th century to the start of the 14th century. It is at the junction of several main roads linking to other important parts of the country. It is about from Colombo, from Kandy and from Matale. Located at an altitude of above sea level, Kurunegala is surrounded by coconut plantations and rubber estates. There are eight very noticeable large rocks that encircle and dominate the city. Kurunegala's rocks rise from the plain below and have characteristic names, six of which come from the animals that they are imagined to represent. The largest among them is Ethagala or the "Elephant Rock" (though the translation is actually tusker), reaches . The shape of Ethagala resembles an elephant. Etymology Kurunegala has been n ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Yapahuwa
Yapahuwa (Sinhalese language : යාපහුව) was one of the ephemeral capitals of medieval Sri Lanka. The citadel of Yapahuwa lying midway between Kurunagala and Anuradhapura was built around a huge granite rock rising abruptly almost a hundred meters above the surrounding lowlands. In 1272, King Bhuvenakabahu transferred the capital from Polonnaruwa to Yapahuwa in the face of Dravidian invasions from South India, bringing the Sacred Tooth Relic with him. Following the death of King Bhuvenakabahu in 1284, the Pandyans of South India invaded Sri Lanka once again, and succeeded in capturing Sacred Tooth Relic. Following its capture, Yapahuwa was largely abandoned and inhabited by Buddhist monks and religious ascetics. Location and Name The rock fortress complex of Yapahuwa is situated in the North Western Province, Sri Lanka. It is approximately between southeast of Mahawa midway Kurunegala and Anuradhapura. The original name of this Buddhist Heritage is Yapawwa, but now t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
City
A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. It can be defined as a permanent and densely settled place with administratively defined boundaries whose members work primarily on non-agricultural tasks. Cities generally have extensive systems for housing, transportation, sanitation, utilities, land use, production of goods, and communication. Their density facilitates interaction between people, government organisations and businesses, sometimes benefiting different parties in the process, such as improving efficiency of goods and service distribution. Historically, city-dwellers have been a small proportion of humanity overall, but following two centuries of unprecedented and rapid urbanization, more than half of the world population now lives in cities, which has had profound consequences for g ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Sinhalese Language
Sinhala ( ; , ''siṁhala'', ), sometimes called Sinhalese (), is an Indo-Aryan language primarily spoken by the Sinhalese people of Sri Lanka, who make up the largest ethnic group on the island, numbering about 16 million. Sinhala is also spoken as the first language by other ethnic groups in Sri Lanka, totalling about 2 million people as of 2001. It is written using the Sinhala script, which is a Brahmic script closely related to the Grantha script of South India. Sinhala is one of the official and national languages of Sri Lanka. Along with Pali, it played a major role in the development of Theravada Buddhist literature. The early form of the Sinhala language, is attested as early as the 3rd century BCE. The language of these inscriptions with long vowels and aspirated consonants is a Prakrit similar to Magadhi, a regional associate of the Middle Indian Prakrits that has been used during the time of the Buddha. The closest relatives are the Vedda language (an endangered, i ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Gautama Buddha
Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha, was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism. According to Buddhist tradition, he was born in Lumbini, in what is now Nepal, to royal parents of the Shakya clan, but renounced his home life to live as a wandering ascetic ( sa, śramaṇa). After leading a life of begging, asceticism, and meditation, he attained enlightenment at Bodh Gaya in what is now India. The Buddha thereafter wandered through the lower Indo-Gangetic Plain, teaching and building a monastic order. He taught a Middle Way between sensual indulgence and severe asceticism, leading to Nirvana, that is, freedom from ignorance, craving, rebirth, and suffering. His teachings are summarized in the Noble Eightfold Path, a training of the mind that includes meditation and instruction in Buddhist ethics such as right effort, mindfulness, and '' jhana''. He di ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Relic Of The Tooth Of The Buddha
The relic of the tooth of Buddha (Pali ''danta dhātuya'') is venerated in Sri Lanka as a sacred cetiya relic of Lord Buddha, who is the founder of Buddhism, the fourth largest religion worldwide. History The relic in India According to Sri Lankan legends, when the Buddha died in 543 BC, his body was cremated in a sandalwood pyre at Kushinagar and his left canine tooth was retrieved from the funeral pyre by his disciple, Khema. Khema then gave it to King Brahmadatte for veneration. It became a royal possession in Brahmadatte's country and was kept in the city of Dantapuri (modern Puri, Odisha). A belief grew that whoever possessed the tooth relic had a divine right to rule that land. The '' Dāṭhāvaṃsa'' recounts the tale of a war fought over the relic 800 years later between Guhasiva of the republic of Kalinga and a king named Pandu. The relic in Sri Lanka Legend states the Abhayagiri vihāra was first appointed custodianship of the relic when it was brought to the i ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Temple Of The Tooth
The Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic or Sri Dalada Maligawa, ( si, ශ්රී දළදා මාළිගාව) is a Buddhist temple in Kandy, Sri Lanka. It is located in the royal palace complex of the former Kingdom of Kandy, which houses the relic of the tooth of the Buddha. Since ancient times, the relic has played an important role in local politics because it is believed that whoever holds the relic holds the governance of the country. The relic was historically held by Sinhalese kings. The temple of the tooth is a World Heritage Site mainly due to the temple and the relic. Bhikkhus of the two particular chapters, the Malwathu chapters and Asgiri chapters, conduct daily worship in the inner chamber of the temple. Rituals are performed three times daily: at dawn, at noon and in the evenings. On Wednesdays, there is a symbolic bathing of the relic with a herbal preparation made from scented water and fragrant flowers called ''Nanumura Mangallaya''; this holy water ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Gampola
Gampola ( si, ගම්පොල, ta, கம்பளை) is a town located in Kandy District, Central Province, Sri Lanka, governed by an Urban Council. Gampola was made the capital of the island by King Buwanekabahu IV, who ruled for four years in the mid-fourteenth century. The last king of Gampola was King Buwanekabahu V, who ruled the island for 29 years. A separate city was built in Kotte during this time by a noble known as Alagakkonara. The longest sleeping Buddha statue in South Asia is located in the Saliyalapura Temple, Gampola. Attractions Among the remnants of Gampola era, the most famous temples are Lankathilaka, Gadaladeniya and Embekka Devalaya. The ancient stone scripts (Shila Lekhana) of Lankathilaka temple helps to reveal a considerable amount of vital information regarding the Gampola era. The statue of Buddha of the temple indicates style of South Indian arts. The Ambekka Dewalaya possess a large collection of wood carvings, where no other temple in Sri L ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Jaffna Kingdom
The Jaffna Kingdom ( ta, யாழ்ப்பாண அரசு, si, යාපනය රාජධානිය; 1215–1624 CE), also known as Kingdom of Aryachakravarti, was a historical kingdom of what today is northern Sri Lanka. It came into existence around the town of Jaffna on the Jaffna peninsula and was traditionally thought to have been established after the invasion of Kalinga Magha from Kalinga in India.Nadarajan, V. ''History of Ceylon Tamils'', p. 72Indrapala, K. ''Early Tamil Settlements in Ceylon'', p. 16 Established as a powerful force in the north, northeast and west of the island, it eventually became a tribute-paying feudatory of the Pandyan Empire in modern South India in 1258, gaining independence when the last Pandyan ruler of Madurai was defeated and expelled in 1323 by Malik Kafur, the army general of the Delhi Sultanate. For a brief period in the early to mid-14th century it was an ascendant power in the island of Sri Lanka, to which all regional ki ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Aryacakravarti
The Arya Chakravarti dynasty ( ta, ஆரியச் சக்கரவர்த்திகள் வம்சம், Sinhalese: ආර්ය චක්රවර්තී රාජවංශය) were kings of the Jaffna Kingdom in Sri Lanka. The earliest Sri Lankan sources, between 1277 and 1283, mention a military leader of this name as a minister in the services of the Pandyan Empire; he raided the western Sri Lankan coast and took the politically significant relic of the Buddha's tooth from the Sinhalese capital city of Yapahuwa. Political and military leaders of the same family name left a number of inscriptions in the modern-day Tamil Nadu state, with dates ranging from 1272 to 1305, during the late Pandyan Empire. According to contemporary native literature, such as ''Cekaracecekaramalai'', the family also claimed lineage from the Tamil Brahmins of the prominent Hindu pilgrimage temple of Rameswaram in the modern Ramanathapuram District of India. They ruled the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Clock Tower (Kurunegala)
A clock tower is an architectural structure housing a turret clock. Clock Tower may also refer to: Buildings * Clock Tower, Anantapur * Clock Tower of Ateca * Clock Tower, Brighton * Clock Tower, Erode * Clock Tower, Faisalabad * Clock Tower, Herne Bay * Clock Tower, Hong Kong * Clock Tower (Iquique) * Clock Tower, Korçë * Clock Tower of Murshidabad * Clock Tower (Podgorica) * Clock Tower (Rome, Georgia) * Clock Tower, Sialkot * Clock Tower, St Albans * Clock Tower, Tirana * Clock Tower of Ulcinj * Clock Tower (Westminster), the former name of the tower containing Big Ben * Deira Clocktower * The Clocktower (restaurant), restaurant in New York, USA Arts, entertainment and media * ''Clock Tower'' (series), a horror adventure video game series ** ''Clock Tower'' (1995 video game) ** ''Clock Tower'' (1996 video game) ** '' Clock Tower II: The Struggle Within'' ** ''Clock Tower 3'' See also * Big Ben * List of clock towers This is a list of clock towers by locatio ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
|
Kurunegala Elephantrock Buddha Statue1
Kurunegala ( si, කුරුණෑගල, ta, குருணாகல்) is a major city in Sri Lanka. It is the capital city of the North Western Province, Sri Lanka, North Western Province and the Kurunegala District. Kurunegala was an ancient royal capital for 50 years, from the end of the 13th century to the start of the 14th century. It is at the junction of several main roads linking to other important parts of the country. It is about from Colombo, from Kandy and from Matale. Located at an altitude of above sea level, Kurunegala is surrounded by coconut plantations and rubber estates. There are eight very noticeable large rocks that encircle and dominate the city. Kurunegala's rocks rise from the plain below and have characteristic names, six of which come from the animals that they are imagined to represent. The largest among them is Ethagala or the "Elephant Rock" (though the translation is actually tusker), reaches . The shape of Ethagala resembles an elephant. ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |