Mediaeval Sinhalese Art c17.6

c17.6

There are many references in the chronicles and elsewhere, to images made of stone, brick, mud and other materials. Thus, we learn from the Mahāvaṃsa, that at Gaṅgārāma, Kīrti Śrī "caused a fair statue of the Conqueror, nine cubits high, to be hewn out by cunning workmen, skilled in the art of cutting stone and the like crafts. And he covered that beautiful and graceful statue with leaf of gold, so that it looked like the living Buddha." At Riḍī Vihāra he had "a great sleeping image made with fine brick and mortar and clay, and many other images of Buddha also, seated and erect. . . . At the foot of the sleeping image he let make in order, fair images of Ānanda, the constant attendant of Buddha and the preserver of the Law, and of Meṭeiya Bodhisatta, of the pre-eminent Nātha Dēva and of the King Duṭṭha Gāmaṇi.” And he gilded with gold the five large images of Buddha. Figure Again we learn that a priest named Palkumbure Unnānse, of Palkumbure Vihāra, in the sculpture reign of Narēndra Siṃha, “effected repairs in this stone-built vihāra, made a stone image of one carpenter’s cubit high, whitewashed the vihāra buildings, celebrated the festival of netra-pinkama after giving over 25,000 fanams’ worth of things as remuneration to the artists.”*