New year celebrations in Ancient Lanka
Andrew SCOTT
Once again we are amidst another Sinhala and Tamil New Year during
which a majority of the inhabitants of Sri Lanka will participate in
social, cultural and religious observances which have been inherited
from generation to generation over the past centuries.
And for a change I propose to delve into the ways in which the
Sinhala and Tamil new year was celebrated with pomp and pageantry in Sri
Lanka during the ancient times about which early writers give exuberant
details.
John Davy's “The Account of the Interior of Ceylon and Its
Inhabitants” (1821) gives vivid details about the new year as observed
in the Kandyan kingdom during the time of the Sinhala kings. He writes:
“There were four principal national festivals observed in the ancient
times: The Avurudu Mangalyaya or the feast of the new year, the
Perahera, the Kaitiaya Mangalyaya or the festival of lamps and the Aluth
Sahal Mangalyaya or the feast of the new rice. These festivals seem to
have been instituted both for religious and political objectives.”
The vivid descriptions Davy gives are illustrative of the state of
society, the character of the people of the country and its government.
He further says that “Before the approach of the New Year, the king's
physicians and astrologers had certain duties to perform.
The former had to superintend the preparation of a thousand small
pots of the juices of wild medicinal plants at the Natha Devale from
whence, carefully covered and sealed, they were sent to the palace and
distributed with much ceremony to the other temples. The duty of the
astrologers was to form a Nekat Wattoruwa.
At the time appointed for the commencement of the new year the king
sat on his throne in state, surrounded by his chiefs, and the event was
announced to the public. In ancient times the king himself, as the head
of state and the nation, went to the field and turned the first sod with
the royal golden plough.”
An earlier writer, Robert Knox (1681) writing about the new year
festivities in ancient Sri Lanka says: “In their new year, upon a
special and good day (for which the astrologers are consulted) the king
washes his head, which is a very great solemnity among them. The palace
is all adorned with thoranas, a sort of triumphal arches, that make a
very fine show. On the top of the poles are flags flying, and all about
hung full of painted cloth with images and figures of men, beasts, birds
and flowers. Fruits also are hung up in great order and exactness. On
each side of the entrance of the arch stand plantain trees with bunches
of plantains on them as if they were growing. The things which the
people carry as their rents and taxes are wine, oil, corn, honey, wax,
cloth, iron, elephants teeth (tusks), tobacco and money.”.
Regarding their play on new year day Robert Knox writes: “only at
their new year they will sport and be merry one with another. Their
chief play is to bowl coconuts one against the other, to try which is
the hardest. There is another sport which generally all people are used
to with much delight, being as they called it, a sacrifice to one of the
their Gods.
The benefit of it is that it frees the country from grief and
diseases. For the beastliness of the exercise they never celebrated it
near any town nor in the sight of women, but in a remote place. When
they would be merry and particularly at their great festival in the new
moon they have people that show pretty tricks and feats of activity
before them.”
One of the most interesting things he mentions is that “Drunkenness
they do greatly abhor, neither are there many that do give themselves to
it. Tobacco likewise they account a vice, but yet is used both by men
and women.”
Discoursing on astronomers and their skill he says: “These
astronomers tell them also when the old year ends to the very minute. At
which time they cease from all work, except the king's which must not be
omitted.
They acquaint them also with the good hour of the new year they are
to begin to work. At which time every man and woman begin to do somewhat
in their employment they intend to follow the ensuing year.”
|