Sigiriya — the Lion Rock
After a fantastic visit to Dambulla but with terrible accommodation thanks to a drunken guesthouse owner, it was a great relief to find a lovely house in Sigiriya with a warm, friendly family away from the crowded, touristic part of town. Away from the main street that was full of souvenir shops, restaurants and cafes selling non-local food, it was in a quiet, leafy village with the main attraction accessible on foot.
Without wasting any time, my friend and I headed straight to the site. Our first stop was a lotus pond with a semblance of a reflection of Sigiriya. The massive rock somewhat resembling a feline snout, is a volcanic formation rising at least 200 metres above the rest of the jungle landscape. A few tourists were riding on an elephant which had entered the pond and was spraying water with its trunk.
Walking around the pool, we went to the ticket counters, got our respective tickets and crossed a moat to enter a long pathway that led to the rock. Lining the path were ancient pools and gardens that used a complex system of waterways and conduits that trapped rainwater during the monsoons and created fountains. Sri Lankan visitors were dressed in their best white clothes to visit Sigiriya.
The path, through lawns and pools led to the Boulder Gardens. It ended at a stairway climbing through a gap between a couple of large round rocks. As I made my way up, it was impossible not to stop every now and then to take a look at the verdant setting from which this rock rose up.
Sigiriya is said to date back to the 3rd century BCE and there are several legends associated with its past. Some historians believe that it was a fortress built by King Kashyapa in 477 CE after usurping the throne from his father King Dhatusena. He was not a royal since unlike Moggallana, his half-brother and heir to the throne, was not the son of the queen. He committed parricide and built his kingdom in Sigiriya, safer than the royal capital of Anuradhapura, while Moggallana fled to India to raise an army and avenge his father’s death.
During his reign, he undertook what must have been challenging and ingenious construction work to build a palace on the flat top of the hill, a fortress, lush and lavish gardens and incredible artwork that live to tell the tales of the past. I climbed to the middle of the rock to find a smooth orange wall called the Mirror Wall. It is said that the wall, built using bricks and plaster, was so smooth that the king could see his reflection in it. Centuries later, visitors inscribed Sinhala poems on it and some of the hundreds of verses can be seen even today.
King Kashyapa, while engineering this architectural marvel did not neglect art. I continued up from the Mirror Wall and reached a rocky wall covered in exquisite frescoes depicting women, mostly bare-breasted, performing rituals with plates of what I assumed to be offerings. Some of them gingerly held delicate-looking flowers. A day earlier, I was at the cave temples of Dambulla which, along with these paintings took me back to Ajanta in India where similar frescoes can be found in a series of caves.
I felt lucky to be able to admire these beautifully preserved masterpieces from more than a millennium ago. Sigiriya is rightfully a UNESCO world heritage site.
At the end of the 5th century, Moggallana returned with an army and defeated Kashyapa who apparently killed himself when his army retreated. The capital was shifted back to Anuradhapura while Sigiriya became a Buddhist monastery complex until the 14th century. The place declined as Sri Lankan royal history went on its own path with the Kandyan kingdom coming to power followed by British occupation. It was during this last period that the site was stumbled upon and later studied by archaeologists.
After appreciating the frescoes for several moments, I continued to the Lion Gate — giant lion paws on either side of a staircase leading to the summit. Centuries of erosion reveals orange bricks under the grey structures. The sharp claws are truly formidable. From this terrace, the view of the gardens below is magnificent and you realise how extraordinary Sigiriya or Sinhagiri, meaning lion rock, really is.
I had already seen so many fascinating aspects of this place that it was quite stunning to reach the summit to fully grasp the astounding labour building Sigiriya must have entailed. The climb was not difficult but some physically unfit tourists were having a tough time. Imagine what it must have been like 1,500 years ago, ascending this rocky outcrop to build a palace on its summit!
The top of the hill is not entirely flat. Its smooth terraced surface is covered in brick foundations of what must have been Kashyapa’s palace complex. Today, it is left with rectangles of green and orange from the grass and bricks that cover every square inch of the summit. The ruins cascade across the top of the mound. There are even pools presumably made for the inhabitants to access water.
Amongst the visitors were Buddhist pilgrims in maroon or orange robes. I relaxed for the rest of the afternoon and exchanged travel stories with a couple of Japanese girls. I stayed there until the sun began to set, when it was time for the site to close. I made my way down with a Swiss couple who I had seen in Ella while my friend took a different route.
I waited for him for around half an hour at the bottom and then walked along the moat to the other exit. Not finding him there, I returned to the guesthouse and asked the family if he was back but they hadn’t seem him either. The old man of the house accompanied me to the touristic part of the town where I saw him in a restaurant. Relieved, we joined him for dinner and went back to the village for a comfortable night, anticipating the next stop of Sri Lanka’s Cultural Triangle.
Hi, I am Prajwal Madhav. I hope you enjoy my posts.
