Mediaeval Sinhalese Art c9.29

c9.29

At first sight it seems strange to suppose that many of them were of Indian origin; yet this is a point on which no doubt can be entertained. Numerous references to the importation of artificers from Southern India have been given in Chapter I.; that the practice continued even into the eighteenth century is attested by contemporary records and *sannas*. The *navandannō* at any one time, speaking of the eighteenth and immediately preceding centuries at least, consisted partly of indigenous craftsmen, and partly of newly-settled Tamil artificers, coming from Southern India, to work for the king, who showed them favour and made them grants of land. Hence it is that not only do we find the closest correspondence in detail and technique between South Indian (Tamil) and Sinhalese work; but also that the artificer families have often Hindu names (such as Rājēśvara Dēvasurēndra), they preserve traces of Śiva worship (such as Sanskrit *ślokas* written in his praise), and of other Hindu ceremonies (*nētra maṅgalya*, etc.); their technical works are obviously a part of the Indian *Śilpaśāstra*; some of their technical terms are corruptions of Tamil words; they make use of Hindu *mantrams* (cf. p. 74); they are occasionally referred to as *Kammālar*; and so forth. The community of design elements would not *Immigrant* *Tamil* *craftsmen* alone suffice to prove the recent Indian origin of many of the craftsmen, as the decorative motifs go back to a source common to both India and Ceylon.