Lankan History with Achinthya Nanayakkara

Sri Lanka had gunpowder tech 200 years before Portuguese arrival and known of such tech since Dambadeniya period. All gun images above r made by Sri Lankans, and horns and pouches to store the powder.. Image 3 and 4 are of the Kandyan Wall Guns. the Mahathuwakku, its gigantism can be seein in comparison to myself (BOOM BOOM to the Dutch trying to get in). And image 5 is the mahathuwakku of Sri Wikrama Rajasinghe's personal armory!! Its almost comedic to see Temple art of a dudes with a guns. And 9,10 r literally called Kodithuwakku 😭. We had canons too, the golden one, although rly rlly small belonged to Keerthi Sri Rajasinghe, recently returned by the Dutch Rijksmuseum (A reddit post on that ) [Image courtesies to the Colombo National Museum and their non-restriction of photography as long as not used for profit.. that's fair use and I'm not advocating for firearms, merely appreciating our indigenous guns on visits to the museum] As stated in the plaque in image 7. we had...

These photos are of 3 Chola inscriptions from 10th/11th centuries AD, from the Colombo National Museum. Although from SL, they are Chola, which also makes them heritage of Tamil Nadu too. Tamil Nadu and SL during mideaval and ancient times had amazing histories and heritages. (Courtesy of Colombo Museum) The above '2 inscription 1 pillar' inscription, "refers to an endowment for the burning of the perpetual Lamp at Teruviramesvaram at Matota [Mannar] by a dignitary serving under king Rajendra Cola (1012-1044 AC). Three merchant had accepted responsibilties for the endowment". The Cholas had control over the three key seaports at Mannar, Jaffna, and even Trincomalee (Thirukkomalai/Thrikunaamalai), which is a huge leg-up in the Indian Ocean. The Merchant Guilds were an integral part of Chola way of doing things.. there are coins of Nanadesin and Ayinurwur merchant guilds even as south as Hambanthota, and this inscription depicts that aspect, that merchants were given ke...

250 million years ago was the Triassic period, the supercontinent Pangea, which roughly existed upto the Jurassic (Image 1,2). I like how Sri Lanka was just sandwiched between Antarctica, Mozambique, Madagascar, and Kerala. It's interesting to think that during this age of the dinosaurs, one would be able to walk from what at present are; Matara/Hambanthota/Galle to 'Norwegian' Antarctica, Kalutara/Colombo to Mozambique, Mannar/Kilinocci/Jaffna to Madagascar, and Batticaloa/Trincomalee to Kerala. I couldn't find anything about the fauna of SL in this period.. which is not cool.. there must've been all sorts of animals roaming around, but the very limited fossil records just have to offer ferns. Bruh. Also Triassic 'SL' was soo south of the equator, so must've experienced seasons too. Snow? I don't have sources. There r 4 major models on the future continents 250 million years into the future. The most popular online, but seemingly the second most lik...

The following was a excerpt of edhaje's Ming Treasure Fleet video on YouTube. idk where the visuals are from, or whether visuals from two different sources have been combined to make this part.. but either way, to know that something looking like this happened on our soil, just 200 years after Polonnnaruwa, would always be interesting.. its the only edit about Ming-Kotte War on the whole Internet so far 😄 Source - https://youtu.be/es__Le3eob0?si=dluap4AOWST9snHv Actually, I'll attach edhaje's video on Zheng He's treasure voyages, cuz its wonderful, and this channel is due all the well deserved credit for creating that scene.. and comprehensively documenting stuff of many topics.  Long story short: Alakeshwara allowed for Piracy in Palk Straight and surrounding areas, the Ming were pissed, and were able to depose of Alakeshwara in the Ming-Kotte War, and have Parakramabahu VI installed, who was "elected by the Sinhalese present at the Ming court, nominated by the M...

The Aztecs were sovereign till 1521 which was when Buvanekabahu VII was ruling Kotte.. and Incas were sovereign till 1533.. which was during the time of Mayadunne and just when Kandy came into existence.. its cool that we had the Portuguese instead of Spannish 💀 Moving on to the pre-colonials: It was also very interesting to find out that Polonnaruwa was essentially a mideaval kingdom, with King Mahaparakramabahu living at about the same time as Richard the Lionheart. Mahaparakramabahu lived just 300ish years before Portuguese arrival, which was 500ish before now. It's a testament to the longevity of Anuradhapura, which lived on from 437 BC to 1017 AD, again ending at early mideaval. As a matter of fact, it was interesting to see that even South Indian dynasties had a similar longevity, with even Pandya living on till 1618 AD. Everything afterwards seems to have happened very fast 😂.. Polonnaruwa existed only for 162 ish years, virtually 3-4 generations, and everything good about...

I swear, many years back, I thought I saw the predictions going to 40 million.. anyways, it seems to well known now that many countries will have their populations peak and then decline. But to see how exactly quantitatively it was gonna happen to SL was eye opening. • 2025: 21.84 million • 2030: 21.47 million • 2035: 21.40 million • 2040: 21.39 million • 2045: 21.08 million • 2050: 21.08 million • 2060: 20.50 million • 2070: 19.50 million • 2080: 18.50 million • 2090: 17.50 million • 2100: 15.46 million It was interesting to see the population of this island wont exceed 22.3 million, at 2037. Also, the Port City Colombo lease will end in 2113 I hear, there would seem to be less than 15 million Sri Lankans to see that day 💀 Source: https://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/sri-lanka-population Posted to r/srilanka as u/The_Cosmic_Learner  Achinthya Nanayakkara 22.03.2025

Rani Padmini, now infamous from the movie Padmaavat, was canonically from SL. Its hard to say if the lore of Rani Padmini is a historical truth, or story telling, or a legend that comes from a background of truth, its kind of a nice touch to see north Indian works involving SL. Mewar being in present day Rajasthan, and the vague estimates of her lifetime being 13th 14th centuries, putting it in late Polonnaruwa to more likely Dambadeniya/Yapahuwa eras. It was a gentle surprise to come across this lore, and while the history is debated, its good lore nontheless Upon posting to r/srilanka, u/ariel31103 replied "Once I saw in a podcast prof raj somadeva mentioning that, there was a princess named padmini in dambadeniya kingdom and later she was sent to India.", followed by affirmations. On the other hand u/Backward-Dealer354 replied "But its more likely that she is a myth created by the Sufi Muslims, Hindu Nath and Jains to perpetrate specific agendas about the siege of Chi...

 It's kinda funny that Andare has a wiki page, as if he were a real dude, even tho he's folk lore, Keerthi Sri Rajasinghe lol. I randomly remembered Andare and his lore, and thought of looking up the origin of his lore. I heard that his name was a derivative of Andres, so that his lore should have originated after European arrival, after 1505.  The Wikipedia article is a bit sus, linking his time period to that of Keerthi Sri Rajasinghe, without a proper source.. and the dates, while plausible r inconsistent. Doesn't even state if he was real, a story, or legends based on a real person.. so less info. Kotte, Sitawaka, and Kandy were the only kingdoms that existent after European arrival. If we are to take Lord Wiki's words for granted, it is very hilarious imagine Keerthi Sri Rajasinghe dealing with Andare's antics.. the sugar eating, eating jambu, the wives talking loudly incident.. having met his statue at Dambulla Cave Temple last time, I can imagine him being li...