MUSINGS:

Early travellers of Ceylon

by Padma Edirisinghe

The above headline is just a garbled presentation of the title of the famous book by the more famous H.A.J. Hulugalle. Only the ingenuity of a writer like him can present the 'ordeals' of eighteen travellers in our universe within a mere 187 pages.

Why do I say 'Ordeals'? Simply because they were that. In the past fogged with endless time these men (not a single woman for obvious reasons that many a libertine female would disdain) went about recklessly crossing not only beast-ridden forests but storm-ridden oceans. Needless to say our cosmos then was not only minus jumbo jets but even semblances of rugged air and road and sea travel. Chinese monk travellers cumbersomely clad in robes, hung on to branches when they had to cross a river and playing see saw landed on the other bank.

Treasures

Were they hunting for treasures? No. Just hunting for more precious Dhamma books. Buddhism had arrived in China rather late and the more they read Buddhist literature more they longed for more texts on the subject, despite the monstrous adventures faced. Fahien, as he held on to the Dhamma texts he had collected in our island was nearly thrown out to the mighty oceanic waters. The other passengers had never seen the like of the ochre robed monk and concluded that the constant perils their ship was subject to was caused by a hoodoo connected to the Chinese passenger so colourfully swathed in yellow and brown attire.

But we will not limit ourselves to him, alone and we will go on to give some brief details about these reckless travellers, a good many of whom included Ceylon in their itinerary as this pearl of the Indian ocean rested there like a coy damsel in the bed of the Indian ocean beckoning weary travellers.

Hulugalle lists Pliny as the first traveller of Ceylon, which with apologies to the great writer, is a lie. Never did Pliny land on our shores. Maybe the author exercised poetic justice considering the magnitude of the fame of Pliny who was serving in the imperial Court of Emperor Claudius of the Roman Empire.

Revenue

It was at this time that a Roman ship collecting revenue in the Red Sea was driven by strong Monsoon winds to a port known as Hippuros in Ceylon identified later as Kudramalie sited between Puttalam and Mannar. It was the captain of this ship and a few officers who really can be eulogized as the first Western foreigners of a rather high calibre who landed in our island.

King Chandra Mukha Siva had been king here then, who quite contrary to Rajasinghe 11 had treated these travellers very well. It makes one wonder whether human values had deteriorated over the years. Having enjoyed the hospitality of the host country, they return with four ambassadors too. This sending of ambassadors had not been a novel practice for our kings according to Tennent who refers to several embassies sent from Ceylon and referred in Chinese writings. The ambassadors who go to the Roman Court wax eloquent on their country and Pliny, the famed historian and rapporteur who later dies in the angry fires of Vesuvius, gives ear to the tales told of Ceylon. What was the medium language used?

Ethnicity

Strangely TAMIL. In fact a hint is made as to the ethnicity of the ambassadors. Rachias is the name of the leader, and if Rachias is taken to correspond to Raja in Sinhala a Tamil identity could be insinuated. Tamil was a language used in commerce and international travel then while Sinhala was of secular usage and perhaps four Tamils were chosen because of the above language proficiency. There seems to have been no petty racial bickering as exemplified by the way these four Tamils (if they were so) behave and hold forth on the glory of Taprobane. And now Pliny does the next best thing to travelling. He writes on what he heard from these visitors. In his voluminous Book on Natural History he devotes a good part of his sixth book to Ceylon. Writes he, "It has been for long thought that Taprobane (name used for Ceylon) was a second world .... till the time of Alexander the Great when it was found that it was an island".

We have dallied too long with Pliny who like Fr.Queroz wrote about Ceylon without coming here. So he really falls out of the true list.

Next in order come Fahien, a Chinese, then Cosmas, a Greek merchant, Marco Polo, a Venetian, Marignoli and Odoric, from Italy, Ibn Batuta, a Moor, Ching Ho, again a Chinese Admiral, Spilbergen, a Dutch admiral, Varthema of Bolonga, Boschower, a Dutch Admiral, next another Dutch Admiral, then Ribeiro, a Portuguese, Knox from England, De Lanerolle, a French, Schweitzer, a German, Pybus and Boyd and High Cleghorn and Doyley, all Englishmen. (Indians are excluded due to the constant contacts).

They fall into this special list for they were not only travellers but writers too who find the island great stuff to write on. This is what Emerson Tenant, a writer cum administrator has this to say of the island's "eligibility" for stuff for writing.

Authors

"There is no island in the world, Great Britain not excepted that has attracted the attention of authors in so many distant ages and so many different countries as Ceylon".

It should be noted that there would have been scores of travellers from other countries who came to the island and the above only form a selected group. Was the selection random? Or prejudiced by way of bracketing those who adulated the island? For example, out of the Italian travellers, Marignoli draws attention since he was so enthralled with nature's beauties here that on hearing the waterfalls cascade down the mountains, he could hear the gurgling sound of the waterfalls in heaven. Taprobane to him was so close to paradise.