Who was the last Sinhala queen?

by Padma EDIRISINGHE

Sorry for the negative beginning but the queen portrayed here and in our Colombo Museum though a consort of our last king, Sri Wickrama Rajasinghe is not our last Sinhala queen. The novelty and attractiveness of her Western–styled dress would have egged on the artist. In the context of the fact that South Indian women are much addicted to the six-yard saree and heavy jewellery yet that she is dressed in a gown like attire is rather curious and carries another tale that we will reserve for a later occasion. Suffice it to state here that new dresses for the deposed royal family had to be freshly sewn since all the attire of both males and females were stripped off. The gruesome act took place at Medamahanuwara, with the Nilames playing a game of vendetta against the murder of the Ehelapola family. It was the Kandyan Spring.

He too had Indian wives but as all were childless, a daughter of a chieftain named Unamboowa of a hamlet embedded in the hilly ranges circumventing the city of Gampola nearly ascended to this position since she had a son by the king. If not for the jealousy of the adigars, he would have succeeded the father. But the adigars opted for a princess from India. Actually that had been the tradition more or less. Imported queens, the higher the noblesse.

Nayakkar dynasty

The Anthahpura system that prevailed among the Asian royal dynasties, nuddled things nore. That Vira Parakrama finally married a South Indian princess is famous news nade more famous or infamous by the succession law aligned to it establishing the Nayakkar dynasty here. That the rather meek Vimladharmasurya 11 broke this established traditon too cannot be believed. In fact, that the Lion King, Rasinghe Deiyo or Rajasinghe 11 too had wedded princesses from South India seems obvious from Baldeus. That takes us back to the earlier reign, that of king Senerat, an ex-Bhikkhu (son of Henerathhamy of Matale), who used his court status to entrench his claim to the throne of Kandy. Dona Catherina was forced to marry him when king Vimaladharmasurya died. So, she could easily be dubbed as the Last Sinhala queen if not due to the fact hat her ethnicity was diluted by her religion, Christianity.

Political suicide

She had entrusted the education of her children to Father Negrao, a Portuguse friar. Never did she visit a Bhikkhu or led her chilren to do so. Her youngest son, Rajasinghe 11 grew up to be an aethist and was the first and last king to stop the Kandy Perahera. Of couse, nowhere did he proclaim that he had given up Budhism or that he had embraced his mother’s religion. That would have been political suicide. The bonds between the race and religion was so strong.

Sri Lanka has had four queens who were reigning monarchs too. Except for one (Leelawathie) who tainted her name with a reputation for sexual promiscuity plus man slaughter, the other three did quite well.

So, when King Vimaladdharma died, his young queen could have ascended the throne herself but many of her subjects opposed the idea for she was a non—Buddhist. In fact, she had sat on the Kandyan throne for a few days when Senerat came on to the scene and married her thus entrenching his claim to the crown. Perhaps had she volunteered to come over they would have accepted her.But she opted to remain steadfast to her faith sacrificing the throne.

So, that leaves us with the question as to who really qualifies for the title” The last Sinhal queen”.? The answer seems to lie in murky waters. But recently I happened to skim through an article written by Bandu De Silva the prolific writer cum ex—ambassador who turned 80 recently . It was titled ‘Encapsulating two and a half millenniea of history which reproduces a conversation between two Portugusse soldiers into which the last Sinhala queen gets dragged in.

Conversation

Who is she? She is Antannadassin, the daughter of the Christian queen Dona Catherina and the wife of king Senerat ! .After the Christian queen’s death this bhikkhu Senarat was again in a feeble position. So, he forcibly married the daughter.

Was she happy to be the queen of Kandy?

Listen to this conversation which is quoted from “Kandy in the 1630s through the eyes of a soldier-poet and a soldier ethnographer.

“The volume reproduces the text of a dialogue composed by an anonymous author who had served under Capt Consantine de Saa who was defeated in the battle at Uva. the ornamentless queen clad simply seems to earn the best approval to the title. “The last Sinhala queen”.