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Quote - Joseph Pulitzer

"PUT IT BEFORE THEM BRIEFLY SO THEY WILL READ IT, CLEARLY SO THEY WILL APPRECIATE IT, PICTURESQUELY SO THEY WILL REMEMBER IT AND, ABOVE ALL, ACCURATELY SO THEY WILL BE GUIDED BY ITS LIGHT" ***** JOSEPH PULITZER *****
DISCOVER - SRI LANKA: PROLOGUE

IN PRAISE OF MY BEAUTIFUL ISLAND,
INFORMATION, PHOTOGRAPHS AND VIDEO.

THE 13th CENTURY VENETIAN TRAVELER MARCO POLO DESCRIBED THE ISLAND AS 'THE JADE PENDANT IN THE INDIAN OCEAN'. THE ABUNDANCE OF GEMSTONES, SPICES, RAIN FORESTS AND WILDLIFE; THE MAGNIFICENT BEACHES, ANCIENT RUINS AND A WRITTEN HISTORY OF OVER 2500 YEARS MAKE THIS ISLAND A TOURISTS' PARADISE.

THE RUINED CITIES OF ANURADHAPURA AND POLONNARUWA ILLUSTRATE THE GLORY OF THE ANCIENT KINGDOMS. THE GIGANTIC STUPAS AND BUDDHA STATUES ARE AMONG THE BIGGEST MAN MADE STRUCTURES OF THE WORLD. THE MASSIVE RESERVOIRS, BUILT BY ANCIENT KINGS TO IRRIGATE THOUSANDS OF ACRES OF LAND, ARE MARVELS OF HYDRO ENGINEERING. THERE ARE EIGHT UNESCO WORLD HERITAGE SITES IN SRI LANKA

THE ISLAND WAS KNOWN TO THE GREEKS AS 'TAPROBANE' AND TO THE ARABS AS 'SERENDIB'. EARLY MERCHANTS VISITED THE ISLAND IN SEARCH OF GEMSTONES AND SPICES, MAINLY CINNAMON AND PEPPER. COFFEE AND TEA PLANTATIONS WERE STARTED BY THE BRITISH COLONIAL RULERS. CEYLON TEA IS FAMOUS THE WORLD OVER.

TOURISM INDUSTRY IS A MAJOR MONEY SPINNER FOR THIS BEAUTIFUL ISLAND. THE VAST EXPANSE OF BEACHES, RAIN FORESTS AND NATIONAL PARKS WITH HERDS OF WILD ELEPHANTS, THE CENTRAL HIGHLANDS WITH LITHE WATER FALLS, BRING IN THE TOURISTS. THE ISLAND IS DOTTED WITH HUNDREDS OF HOTELS TO ACCOMMODATE THE TRAVELER. AN ISLAND OF 25,000 SQ; MILES HAS 103 RIVERS AND 25000 RESERVOIRS, MOSTLY MAN MADE. WITH VARYING CLIMATIC CONDITIONS THIS IS TRULY A 'SMALL MIRACLE'.

" THE ISLAND OF SRI LANKA IS A SMALL UNIVERSE, IT CONTAINS AS MANY VARIATIONS OF CULTURE, SCENERY AND CLIMATE AS SOME COUNTRIES A DOZEN TIMES ITS SIZE........I FIND IT HARD TO BELIEVE THAT THERE IS ANY COUNTRY WHICH SCORES SO HIGHLY IN ALL DEPARTMENTS - WHICH HAVE SO MANY ADVANTAGES AND SO FEW DISADVANTAGES. LOVELY BEACHES, BEAUTIFUL LANDSCAPES, IMPRESSIVE RUINS, A VIBRANT CULTURE AND CHARMING PEOPLE- NO WONDER SRI LANKA IS A SMALL MIRACLE ".***** Arthur C. Clark *****




Over: 70 Pages, 800 Posts, 1000 Photographs and 900,000 Page views
Showing posts with label colonialism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label colonialism. Show all posts

10 December, 2010

SRI LANKA - BRITISH ERA



During the Napoleonic Wars the United Kingdom, fearing that French control 
of the Netherlands might deliver Sri Lanka to the French, occupied the coastal 
areas of the island (which they called Ceylon) with little difficulty in 1796. In 
1802 by the Treaty of Amiens the Dutch part of the island was formally ceded 
to Britain, and became a crown colony. In 1803 the British invaded the Kingdom 
of Kandy in the 1st Kandyan War, but were bloodily repulsed. In 1815 Kandy 
was occupied in the 2nd Kandyan War, finally ending Sri Lankan independence.

Following the bloody suppression of the Uva Rebellion, the Kandyan peasantry 
were stripped of their lands by the Wastelands Ordinance, a modern enclosure 
movement and reduced to penury. The British found that the uplands of Sri 
Lanka were very suited to coffeetea and rubber cultivation, and by the mid 
19th century Ceylon tea had become a staple of the British market, bringing 
great wealth to a small class of white tea planters. To work the estates, the 
planters imported large numbers of Tamil workers as indentured labourers 
from south India, who soon made up 10% of the island's population. These 
workers had to work in slave-like conditions and to live in line rooms, not 
very different from cattle sheds.
The British colonialists favoured the semi-European Burghers, certain high-
caste Sinhalese and the Tamils who were mainly concentrated to the north 
of the country, exacerbating divisions and enmities which have survived ever 
since. Nevertheless, the British also introduced democratic elements to Sri 
Lanka for the first time in its history. The Burghers were given some degree of 
self-government as early as 1833. It was not until 1909 that constitutional 
development began with a partly-elected assembly, and not until 1920 that 
elected members outnumbered official appointees. Universal suffrage was 
introduced in 1931, over the protests of the Sinhalese, Tamil and Burgher 
elite who objected to the common people being allowed to vote [1],
Source : Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia 

08 December, 2010

SRI LANKA - DUTCH ERA



Dutch Ceylon is a term used synonymously for the period, and the area of 
Ceylon or Sri Lanka that was controlled by the Dutch from 1658–1798 and 
their rule.
In the 17th century, Sri Lanka was partly ruled by the Portuguese invaders 
and the Sinhala Kingdom, who were constantly battling each other. Although 
the Portuguese were not winning the war, their rule was rather burdensome 
to the people of those areas controlled by them. The Dutch were engaged in 
a long war of independence from Spanish rule. In that background, Sinhala King 
(Kandyan King) invited the Dutch to help defeat the Portuguese. The Dutch 
interest in Ceylon was to have a united battle front against the Iberians at 
that time.
After the Sri Lankans betrayal of the Dutch, the Dutch invaded parts of Sri 
Lanka. They retained an area as compensation for the cost of war and gradually 
extended their land. The Dutch gained control of the coastline, but later the 
colonial British rulers succeeded them. The Dutch and British each ruled for 
approximately 150 years.

Contents

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Source : Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia

20 October, 2010

SRI LANKA - COLONIAL ERA






Sri Lanka had always been an important port and trading post in
the ancient world,and was increasingly frequented by merchant 
ships from the Middle East, Persia,Burma ,ThailandMalaysia
,Indonesia and other parts of SoutheastAsia. The islands were 
known to the first European explorers of South Asia and settled 
by many groups of Arab and Malay merchants.
Portuguese colonial mission arrived on the island in1505 headed  
by Lourenço de Almeida, the son of Francisco de Almeida. At that 
point the island consisted of three kingdoms, namely Kandy in the 
central hills,Kotte at the Western coast, and Yarlpanam 
(Anglicised Jaffna) in the north. The Dutch arrived in the 17th century. 
Although much of the coastal regions of the island came under  the 
domain of European powers, the interior, hilly region of the island 
remained independent, with its capital in Kandy.
The British East India Company took over the coastal regions
island controlled by the Dutch in 1796, in 1802 these provinces 
were declared a crown colony under direct rule of the British 
government, The annexation of the Kingdom of Kandy in 1815 
by the Kandyan convention, unified the island under British rule.
Source : Wikipedia the free encyclopedia
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