Sigiriya
Interesting facts
- The paintings once probably spread across much of the western rock face, about 140 metres long and 40 metres high, and old graffiti mention some 500 painted women.
- One medieval visitor recorded on the Mirror Wall that he had come with hundreds of others and, since everyone else wrote poems, he would not.
- Not every mirror-wall poet admired the painted women: one woman wrote of the jealousy a doe-eyed beauty with a string of pearls stirred in her.
- According to the chronicle, Kashyapa killed his father by walling him up alive before seizing the throne.
- The chronicle says Kashyapa's last battle turned when his war elephant changed direction, his troops mistook it for a retreat, and they deserted him.
- Inscriptions in the surrounding rock shelters show that Buddhist monks were living here from around the 3rd century BC, centuries before Kashyapa.
- Finds in the Aligala rock shelter just east of the rock show people were living here around 5,000 years ago.
- A British officer, Major Jonathan Forbes, spotted the overgrown summit in 1831 while riding back from Polonnaruwa, bringing it to wider notice.
- Arthur C. Clarke based the fortress of Yakkagala in his novel The Fountains of Paradise on Sigiriya, saying the real place needed no changes.
- Scenes for Duran Duran's 1982 music video Save a Prayer were filmed on the summit of the rock.
Why it is worth it
Sigiriya is a single column of granite, the eroded plug of an ancient volcano, rising some 180 to 200 metres straight out of the forested plains of central Sri Lanka. According to the chronicle known as the Culavamsa, King Kashyapa I, who seized the throne in 477 after overthrowing and killing his father, made this rock his capital and built a palace on its flat summit, out of reach of the half-brother who had fled to India and vowed revenge. That brother, Moggallana, returned and defeated him in 495. Historians debate parts of the story, and some read the site as primarily a Buddhist complex, but the chronicle's version has given Sigiriya its drama.
The climb is a journey through several worlds. At the base spread some of the oldest landscaped gardens anywhere: symmetrical water gardens with pools, causeways and island pavilions, fed by underground conduits, and fountains that still spurt in the rainy season, set against boulder gardens that follow the natural rock. Halfway up, a sheltered gallery in the cliff holds the famous painted women, often called the Sigiriya maidens or celestial nymphs, their bodies modelled with sweeping strokes, carrying flowers and trays. The paintings once covered much of the western face; today only a small group survives. Next to them runs the Mirror Wall, once polished so smooth the king could see his reflection. From the eighth to the tenth centuries visitors scratched verses on it, many addressed to the painted women, and the scholar Senarath Paranavithana deciphered 685 of them, the only poetry to survive from that era of Sri Lankan history.
On a terrace below the summit, the final staircase begins between two enormous carved lion's paws. They are all that remains of a colossal lion figure through which the ascent once passed, and which gave the place its name, Sinhagiri, the Lion Rock. The summit is covered with the foundations of the palace, terraces and rock-cut cisterns, and from the top the geometry of the gardens and the moats stands out clearly against the jungle, with Pidurangala Rock rising just to the north. After Kashyapa's death the palace was abandoned and the site became a Buddhist monastery until about the fourteenth century. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Getting there
Sigiriya lies in Matale District in the Central Province, about 16 km from the town of Dambulla, from where local buses run to the site. The nearest airport is China Bay Airport (TRR) near Trincomalee, about 79 km away, with limited domestic flights; most visitors arrive through Bandaranaike International Airport (CMB) near Colombo, about 170 km away by road, a drive of several hours.
Plan your visit
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Nearby places
- Dambulla cave temple 16.5 km · temple
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From the encyclopaedia
Sigiriya or Sinhagiri is an ancient rock fortress located in the northern Matale District near the town of Dambulla in the Central Province, Sri Lanka. It is a site of historical and archaeological significance that is dominated by a massive column of granite approximately 180 m (590 ft) high.
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