How is the presence of colonizers reflected in the literary output of local authors? In the case of Sri Lanka, colonized by three different European powers across more than four centuries, the answer is multifaceted. Whether referring to the Portuguese, Dutch, or British, Sri Lankan authors could be by turns conspiratorially conciliatory or opprobriously opposed to these foreigners. In the case of the Dutch, they were consistently portrayed as powerful allies, although dissenting interpretations of their presence as indicating Lanka’s decline also emerged over time.

Allegiances and Grievances with the Hollanders in Sinhala Poetics

The Dutch first appeared as the “Hollanders” (landēsi) in Sinhala literature of the seventeenth century, in a genre known as haṭana kavi, or “war poetry.” Their role as allies to King Rajasinha II (r.1635-1687) was especially emphasized the work Mahā Haṭana, or “The Great War”. It is important to note, however, that the Dutch joined a whole host of foreigners in these war poems that made up the motley crews of the king’s armies, as indicated in this verse from Paraṅgi Haṭana, or “The Portuguese War:”

Groups of Portuguese and Dutch proceed with other people of various countries,

gentle, pleasant, and mild with little brutality, with victory parasols and flags amid the clouds.

Among unbreakable armies, undivergent tributes and ceremonial sashes were brought,

having bowed to famous King Rajasinha’s prosperous pair of feet.

Paraṅgi Haṭana, v.35

Although this poem detailed the defeat of the Portuguese by Rajasinha, defectors from that side apparently joined the king’s Dutch allies and conscripts from various parts of South India. These war poems repeatedly invoke the concept of foreignness as something that is dangerous and even repulsive, but which also carries the potential for great power that can be wielded by mighty rulers who enlist these forces and enjoin them to submit tributes.

Cooperation between the Dutch and Rajasinha, however, quickly dissolved when the king realized that these new foreigners planned to claim the old Portuguese coastal forts for themselves, rather than return them to the Kandyan Kingdom. As time passed, the Dutch themselves entered into direct warfare with subsequent rulers of the kingdom. In the process, we find allegiances transform into grievances in some sectors of Sinhala literature. Some histories known as Rājāvaliya, or “The Line of Kings,” composed after Rajasinha’s death, stated that the Dutch claimed the low country from the Portuguese, but not that it was granted by the king in the customary fashion as prior kings had once done for the Portuguese.

Localized histories

Thereafter, more localized histories written in the Kandyan Kingdom during the late-eighteenth century, such as Madurāpuren Ā Vittiya, or “The Story of Immigrants from Madurai,” cast the Dutch as overt enemies, referencing their brief capture of the capital and praising the times Sinhala forces defeated them in battle, which resulted in rewards of land and titles for the chieftains (some originally from Madurai) who marshalled the troops. This is perhaps why ritual poetry from the same period, used to invoke gods and goddesses, depicts Dutch foreignness as something dangerous that must be tamed. Among the eight Bhairava deities under the goddess Kali’s control, for example, some spoke languages of “Holland” and “Batavia”. (British Library Manuscripts collection, Or.6615 (81) and Or.6615 (418)).

Similarly, a minor deity named Viramunda, who settled in Lanka after sailing from South India, subsequently exerted his divine majesty overseas in all directions, including toward Dutch territory:

To the regions of Burma and Bengal

To the region of that Tamil city of Madurai

To the region of the Hollanders at Batavia

To those regions goes Viramunda’s majesty

Or.6615 (274)

Those authors who lived in the coastal regions under direct Dutch governance, however, were less likely to cast the colonizer as a foe, constrained by their own political futures. Some authors were likely in Dutch employ, which may have inspired one anonymous manuscript of quatrains to list various ports held by the Dutch along the southwestern coast and end by marveling at what they built:

From Tangalle fort to Kalpiti fort is a distance of sixty leagues.

Within that range are ten forts in which Hollanders live.

Eight inns were also built for them to go rest and refresh.

Is there anywhere else in the whole world like Colombo?

Or.6611 (8)

Yet admiring the Dutch did not necessarily require renouncing Kandy. A Buddhist monk from the southern city of Matara, for example, used the first several verses of his poetic re-creation of a jataka tale to praise both the Kandyan king, Kirti Sri Rajasinha (r.1747-1782), as well as the Dutch:

Always bodhisattva brave,

this King Kirti Sri Rajasinha,

chest adorned with the splendorous moon,

shines on Sri Lanka as people feel the glory.

…

Conquering this mandala,

in Matara city so beautiful,

as well as Galle and Colombo,

gradually the three cities became united famously.

There, those from the Holland country,

coming in the manner of divine armies,

situated so as to experience prosperity,

ruled over the region happily.

Or.6611 (128)

Considering that Kirti Sri Rajasinha’s court remained reliant on Dutch ships to refresh monastic ordination lineages with the help of Thai Buddhists across the Bay of Bengal, it is sensible that this monk saw fit to laud both sides of the political divide. Overall, any author’s willingness to praise or critique colonizers depended on political exigencies outside their direct control.

Prophesying the Dutch

Another way that Lankan authors of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries processed the fact of Dule rule was to suggest that they had seen it coming all along. In Sinhala literature, such retroactive prophesies appear in a text known as Nītibandhanaya, or “The Compendium of Laws.” Most of this work is devoted to detailing laws about caste, enumerating their types and describing their duties. Preceding these details, however, every manuscript of Nītibandhanaya begins with the story of a prophesy that the Buddha delivered to the god Saman, guardian of the mountain of Sumanakuta, also known as Sri Pada, where the Buddha left a footprint. In every version of this prophesy, the glory of a fallen Lanka is ultimately restored by a mythical king named Brājita. In some manuscripts, Brājita simply reclaims Lanka after a Tamil invasion. In others, however, he rescues the island from farther flung foreigners, including the Portuguese and the Dutch. In manuscripts that mention the defeat of the Portuguese, the Dutch are described favorably, as Brājita arrives and, “due to faith in the Hollanders, destroys and eliminates those Portuguese with them and delivers victory to the Hollanders.” The Buddha foretells that the Hollanders, “due to maintaining the command over my religion (sāsana), will live a full eight hundred years.” (You can digitally scroll through this manuscript here.)

A later manuscript of Nītibandhanaya, however, modified the prophecy to account for the next colonizer, as the Buddha foresees the Hollanders’ defeat at the hands of the British. In this version, the Hollanders are critiqued as purveyors of heretical religion who filled the island with their priests, and Brājita’s faith in the Hollanders does not cause him to deliver them victory, but simply to not destroy them so that he can use two foreign powers for Lanka’s gain: “Because that king had faith in the Hollanders, not destroying either group, he elevated the country and brought the English to whom he entrusted the country.” (Or.6606 (49).

 Amending the prophesy in this way allowed the Nītibandhanaya scribe to account for the fact that Dutch people still lived in Lanka under British rule. It also allowed him to use Buddhist myth as prior writers had done for the Dutch to conceptually recast the British takeover, depicting them as invited by a heroic king in a story predicted by the Buddha.

Tamil literature

Meanwhile, in Tamil literature, prophecies about the Dutch were decidedly less favorable. One appears in Kōṇēcar Kalveṭṭu, or “Koneswaram Inscription,” a history of the Śaiva temple of Koneswaram, near Trincomalee. Although they are not as bad as the Portuguese, “who will come to destroy the great Koneswaram,” the Dutch still portend a downfall, as “the Hollanders will conquer, at which time the lion clan and solar clan will decline.” (reference from Kavirājāvarōtayaṉ, Kōṇēcar Kalveṭṭu. (Colombo: Intucamaya Kalācāra Aluvalkaḷ Tiṇaikkaḷam, 1993), p.86). The original core text of Kōṇēcar Kalveṭṭu mentions only the Portuguese; these lines about the Dutch were interpolated into later copies that also mention the British, an updating of prophesy similar to Nītibandhanaya.

Another such prophetic text is the Tamil work titled Yāḻppāṇa Vaipava Mālai, or “The Garland of Jaffna History,” one of the only Lankan Tamil compositions to have received a full English translation. An opening verse says that it was composed by the author Mayilvakanan in 1736 at the request of the Dutch governor. Most of the text concerns the Aryacakravarti lineage of Jaffna kings, and the prophecy is delivered by a sage to King Ciṅkai Pararācasēkaraṉ (r.1478-1519) concerning the eventual downfall of his progeny at the hands of the Portuguese. This prediction was later updated like Nītibandhanaya to account for the Dutch and the English, too, and its description of the Hollanders (ulāntēcar) is unforgiving:

The king of the Hollanders will skillfully usurp the Portuguese…He will make regulations to completely abolish the customs of the Śaiva religion, having restricted the communities and not allowed observances to be followed in temples of the Śaiva religion. He will build shrines to his own religion and compel people into those religious affairs. He will establish myriad taxes and cause suffering for the citizens.

Translated from Kula Capānātaṉ (ed.), Yāḻppāṇa Vaipavamālai, Koḻumpu: Intucamaya Kalācāra Aluvalkaḷ Tiṇaikkaḷam, 1995) p.53.

Although the scribe who updated Yāḻppāṇa Vaipava Mālai found the subsequent English colonizers more amenable for the freedom of religion they allowed, he predicted these foreigners would also be undone by the French, who themselves would ultimately be defeated by another mythic hero named the Great King Ciṅkaiyariya. In this way, prophesying the presence of colonizers not only helped account for the present by writing it into the past, but also fostered hope for a better future when Lanka would be restored to its rightful rulers.

Guest contribution by Alexander McKinley.
You can also read his story on the Minister from Kirimetiyawa
and his war poem, ‘the Great War’.