Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and Topographical with Notices of Its Natural History Part 98

[Footnote 2: HAZMA ISPAHANENSIS, p. 102; REINAUD, _Relation, &c._, vol.

i. p. 35.]

[Footnote 3: Ma.s.sOUDI, _Meadows of Gold_, Transl. of SPRENGER, vol. i.

p. 246.]

[Footnote 4: ABOU-ZEYD, vol. i. p, 14; REINAUD _Discours_, pp. 44, 78.]

[Footnote 5: DULAURIER, _Journ. Asiat._, vol. xiix, p. 141; VINCENT, vol. ii, pp. 464,507.]

[Footnote 6: ABOU-ZEYD, p. 15; REINAUD, _Mem. sur l'Inde_, p. 201.]

[Footnote 7: PLINY, lib. vi. ch. xxvi.; _Periplus Mar. Erythr_.]

[Footnote 8: ROBERTSON, _Au Ind._, sec. ii. Periplus of the Erythrean Sea describes these Ceylon crafts as rigged vessels, [Greek: histiopepoiemenois neusi].]

COSMAS was a merchant of Egypt in the reign of Justinian, who, from the extent of his travels, acquired the t.i.tle of "Indico-pleustes." Retiring to the cloister, he devoted the remnant of his life to the preparation of a work in defence of the cosmography of the Pentateuch from the errors of the Ptolemaic astronomy.[1] He died in the year 550, before his task was completed, and one of the last portions on which he was employed was an account of Taprobane, taken down from the reports of Sopater, a Greek trader whom he had met at Adule in Ethiopia, when on his return from Ceylon.

[Footnote 1: [Greek: Christianike Topographia], sive _Christianorum Opinio de Mundo_. This curious book has been printed entire by Montfaucon from a MS. in the Vatican Coll. Patr., vol. ii. p. 333.

Paris, 1706 A.D. There is only one other MS. known, which was in Florence; and from it THEVENOT had previously extracted and published the portion relating to India in his _Relation des Dic. Voy_., vol. i.

Paris, 1576 A.D.]

Sopater, in the course of business as a merchant, sailed from Adule in the same s.h.i.+p with a Persian bound for Ceylon, and on his arrival he and his fellow-traveller were presented by the officers of the port to the king, who was probably k.u.mara Das, the friend and patron of the poet Kalidas.[1] The king received them with courtesy, and Cosmas recounts how in the course of the interview Sopater succeeded in convincing the Singhalese monarch of the greater power of Rome as compared with that of Persia, by exhibiting the large and highly finished gold coin of the Roman Emperor in contrast with the small and inelegant silver money of the Shah. This story would, however, appear to be traditional, as Pliny relates a somewhat similar anecdote of the amba.s.sadors from Ceylon in the reign of Claudius, and of the profound respect excited in their minds by the sight of the Roman denarii.

[Footnote 1: Cosmas wrote between A.D. 545 and 550; and the voyage of Sopater to Ceylon had been made thirty years before. k.u.maara Das reigned from A.D. 515 to A.D. 524. Vincent has noted the fact that in his interview with the Greek he addressed him by the epithet of Roomi, "[Greek: su Romeu]," which is the term that has been applied from time immemorial in India to the powers who have been successively in possession of Constantinople, whether Roman, Christian, or Mahommedan.

Vol. ii. p. 511, &c.]

As Sopater was the first traveller who described Ceylon from personal knowledge, I shall give his account of the island in the words of Cosmas, which have not before been presented in an English translation.

"It is," he says, "a great island of the ocean lying in the Indian Sea, called Sielendib by the Indians, but Taprobane by the Greeks. The stone, the hyacinth, is found in it; it lies beyond the pepper country.[1]

Around it there are a mult.i.tude of exceedingly small islets[2], all containing fresh water and coco-nut palms[3]; these (islands) lie as close as possible together. The great island itself, according to the accounts of its inhabitants, is 300 _gaudia_[4], or 900 miles long, and as many in breadth. There are two kings ruling at opposite ends of the island[5], one of whom possesses the hyacinth[6], and the other the district, in which are the port and emporium[7], for the emporium in that place is the greatest in those parts."

[Footnote 1: Malabar or Narghyl Arabia.]

[Footnote 2: The Maldive Islands.]

[Footnote 3: [Greek: Argellia] pro [Greek: nargellia], from _narikela_, the Sanskrit, and _narghyl_, Arab, for the "coco-nut palm." GILDEMESTER, _Script. Arab_. p. 36.]

[Footnote 4: "[Greek: Gaudia."] It is very remarkable that this singular word _gaou_, in which Cosmas gives the dimensions of the island, is in use to the present day in Ceylon, and means the distance which a man can walk in an hour. VINCENT, in his _Commerce and Navigation of the Ancients_, has noticed this pa.s.sage (vol. ii, p. 506), and sayt, somewhat loosely, that the Singhalese _gaou_, which he spells "_ghadia_"

is the same as the _naligiae_ of the Tamils, and equal to three-eighths of a French league, or nearly one mile and a quarter English. This is incorrect; a _gaou_ in Ceylon expresses a somewhat indeterminate length, according to the nature of the ground to be traversed, a gaou across a mountainous country being less than one measured on level ground, and a gaou for a loaded cooley is also permitted to be shorter than for one unburthened, but on the whole the average may be taken _under four miles_. This is worth remarking, because it brings the statement made to Sopater by the Singhalese in the sixth century into consistency with the representations of the amba.s.sadors to the Emperor Claudius in the first, although both prove to be erroneous. It is curious that FA HIAN, the Chinese traveller, whose zeal for Buddhism led him to visit India and Ceylon a century and a half before Cosmas, gives an area to the island which approaches very nearly to correctness; although he reverses the direction in which its length exceeds its breadth. _Fo[)e]-kou[)e]-ki_, c. x.x.xvii. p. 328.]

[Footnote 5: [Greek: "Enantioiallelon"]. This may also mean "at war with one another."]

[Footnote 6: This has been translated so as to mean the portion of the island producing hyacinth stones ("la partie de l'isle ou se trouvent les jacinthes." THEVENOT). But besides that I know of no Greek form of expression that admits of such expansion; this construction, if accepted, would be inconsistent with fact--for the king alluded to held the north of the island, whereas the region producing gems is the south, and in it were also the "emporium," and the harbour frequented by s.h.i.+pping and merchants. I am disposed therefore to accept the term in its simple sense, and to believe that it refers to one particular jewel, for the possession of which the king of Ceylon enjoyed an enviable renown. Cosmas, in the succeeding sentence, describes this wonderful gem as being deposited in a temple near the capital; and Hiouen Thsang, the Chinese pilgrim, says that in the seventh century, a ruby was elevated on a spire surmounting a temple at Anaraj.a.poora "dont l'eclat magnifique illumine tout le ciel."--_Vie de Hiouen Thsang_, lib. iv. p. 199; _Voyages des Pelerins Bouddhistes_, lib. xi. v. ii. p. 141. MARCO POLO, in the thirteenth, century, says the "king of Ceylon is reputed to have the grandest ruby that was ever seen, a span in length, the thickness of a man's arm; brilliant beyond description, and without a single flaw. It has the appearance of a glowing fire, and its worth cannot be estimated in money. The Grand Khan Kublai sent amba.s.sadors to this monarch to offer for it the value of a city, but he would not part with it for all the treasures of the world, as it was a jewel _handed down by his ancestors on the throne_."--_Trans_. MARSDEN, 4to. 1818. It is most probable that the stone described by Marco Polo was not a ruby, but an amethyst, which is found in large crystals in Ceylon, and which modern mineralogists believe to be the "hyacinth" of the ancients. (DANA'S _Mineralogy_, vol. ii. p. 196.) CORSALI says it was a carbuncle (Ramusio, vol. i. p. 180); and JORDAN DE SEVERAC, about the year 1323, repeats the story of its being a ruby so large that it could not be grasped in the closed hand. (_Recueil de Voy_., Soc. Geog. Paris. vol.

iv. p. 50.) If this resplendent object really exhibited the dimensions a.s.signed to it, the probability is that it was not a gem at all, but one of those counterfeits of gla.s.s, in producing which STRABO relates that the artists of Alexandria attained the highest possible perfection (1.

xvi. c. 2. sec. 25). Its luminosity by night is of course a fiction, unless, indeed, like the emerald pillar in the temple of Hercules at Tyre, which HERODOTUS describes as "s.h.i.+ning brightly by night," it was a hollow cylinder into which a lamp could be introduced. _Herod_, ii. 44.

Of the ultimate history of this renowned jewel we have no authentic narrative; but it is stated in the Chinese accounts of Ceylon that early in the fourteenth century an officer was sent by the emperor to purchase a "carbuncle" of unusual l.u.s.tre. "This served as the ball on the emperor's cap, and was transmitted to succeeding emperors on their accession as a precious heirloom, and worn on the birthday and at the grand courts held on the first day of the year. It was upwards of an ounce in weight, and cost 100,000 strings of cash. Every time a grand levee was held during the darkness of the night, the red l.u.s.tre filled the palace, and it was for this reason designated 'The Red Palace-Illuminator.'"--_Tsih-ke_, or _Miscellaneous Record_, quoted in the _Kih che-king-yuen, Mirror of Science_, b. x.x.xiii. p. 1, 2.]

[Footnote 7: The port and harbour of Point de Galle.]

"The island has also a community of Christians[1], chiefly resident Persians, with a presbyter ordained in Persia, a deacon, and a complete ecclesiastical ritual.[2]

[Footnote 1: Nestorians, whose "Catholicos" resided first at Ctesiphon, and afterwards at Mosul. VINCENT, _Periplus_, &c., vol. ii, p. 507. For an examination of the hypotheses based on this statement of Cosmas, see Sir J. EMERSON TENNENT'S _History of Christianity in Ceylon_, ch. i.]

[Footnote 2: [Greek: "Leitourgiat,"] literally _liturgy_; which meant originally the pomp and ceremonial of wors.h.i.+p as well as the form of prayer.]

"The natives and their kings are of different races.[1] The temples are numerous, and in one in particular, situated on an eminence[2], is the great hyacinth, as large as a pine-cone, the colour of fire, and flas.h.i.+ng from a distance, especially when catching the beams of the sun--a matchless sight.

[Footnote 1: [Greek: Allophuloi].]

[Footnote 2: Probably that at Mihintala, the sacred hill near Anaraj.a.poora.]

"As its position is central, the island is the resort of s.h.i.+ps from all parts of India, Persia, and Ethiopia, and, in like manner, many are despatched from it. From the inner[1] countries; I mean China, and other emporiums, it receives silk[2], aloes, cloves, clove-wood, _chandana_[3], and whatever else they produce. These it again transmits to the outer ports[4],--I mean to Male[5], whence the pepper comes; to Calliana[6], where there is bra.s.s and sesamine-wood, and materials for dress (for it is also a place of great trade), and to Sindon[7], where they get musk, castor, and _androstachum_[8], to Persia, the Homeritic coasts[9], and Adule. Receiving in return the exports of those emporiums, Taprobane exchanges them in the inner ports (to the east of Cape Comorin) sending her own produce along with them to each.

[Footnote 1: [Greek: "ton endoteron,"] the countries inside (that is to the east) of Cape Comorin, as distinguished from the outer ports ([Greek: ta exotera]) mentioned below, which lie west of it.]

[Footnote 2: [Greek: "metaxin."] Of this foreign word, applied by the mediaeval Greeks to silk in general, as well as to raw silk, PROCOPIUS says:--[Greek: "Ahute de estin he metaxa, ex hes eiothasi ten estheta ergazesthai, hen palai men h.e.l.lenes mediken, tanun de seriken onomazousi."]--PROCOP. _Persic._ I. _Metaxa_, or anciently _mataxa_, "thread," "yarn," seems to be Latine rather than Greek. The _metaxarius_ was a "yarn-broker;" and the word having got possession of the market, was extended to the woven stuff. The modern Greeks call silk [Greek: metaxa.]]

[Footnote 3: [Greek: "tzandana,"] probably "sandalwood;" sometimes called _agallochum._]

[Footnote 4: [Greek: "ta exotera,"] those lying west of Cape Comorin.]

[Footnote 5: Malabar.]

[Footnote 6: Bombay.]

[Footnote 7: Scinde.]

[Footnote 8: [Greek: "androsthachon."]]

[Footnote 9: Southern Arabia, chiefly Hadramaut.]

"_Sielediba_, or Taprobane, lies seaward about five days' sail from the mainland.[1] Then further on the continent is Marallo, which furnishes _cochlea_[2]; then comes Kaber, which exports '_alabandanum_;'[3] and next is the clove country, then China, which exports silk; beyond which there is no other land, for the ocean encircles it on the east.

_Sielediba_ being thus placed in the middle as it were of India, and possessing the hyacinth, receives goods from all nations, and again distributes them, thus becoming a great emporium."

[Footnote 1: Cosmas probably means "the more distant _ports_ on" the mainland of India.]

[Footnote 2: [Greek: "kochlious,"] probably chanksh.e.l.ls, _turbinella rapa._ See ABOUZEYD, vol. i. p. 6.]

[Footnote 3: [Greek: "alabandanon."]]

This description of the Indian trade by Cosmas is singularly corroborative of the account that had previously been given by the author of the _Periplus_; and as the Singhalese have at all times been remarkable for their aversion to the sea, the country-craft[1], thus mentioned by both authorities as engaged in voyages between Ceylon and the countries east and west of Cape Cornorin, must have been manned in part by Malabars, but chiefly by the Arabs and Persians, who, previous to the time of Cosmas, had been induced to settle in large numbers in Ceylon[2], attracted by the activity of its commerce, and the extensive employment for s.h.i.+pping afforded by its transit trade.

[Footnote 1: [Greek: "topika ploia."]--_Periplus._]

[Footnote 2: REINAUD, _Mem. sur l'Inde_, p. 124. and _Introd._ ABOULFEDA.]

Amongst the objects, the introduction of which was eagerly encouraged in Ceylon, Cosmas particularises horses from Persia; the traders in which were exempted from the payment of customs. The most remarkable exports were elephants, which from their size and sagacity were found to be superior to those of India for purposes of war. Hence the renown accorded to Ceylon, as pre-eminently the birthplace of the Asiatic race of elephants.