Mediaeval Sinhalese Art c21.2

c21.2

It is, then, not altogether surprising that even in India, the traditions of ivory carving “centre round the early Chalukyan and Buddhistic traditions rather than the more recent Dravidian and Indo-Aryan schools of South Indian decoration.”* The same thing is, of course, much more obvious in Ceylon, and we are again reminded of the value of late Sinhalese art as preserving something of the Buddhist Indian art which preceded the more definitely Hindu art of the seventh century and onwards.