CHAP. II.] ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS OF CEYLON. 



331 



made himself master of the island by her influence, he 

 established his capital at Tamana Neuera 1 , and founded 

 a dynasty, which, for nearly eight centuries, retained 

 supreme authority in Ceylon. 



The people whom he mastered with so much facility 

 are described in the sacred books as Yakkhos or "de- 

 mons," 2 and Nagas*, or " snakes ;". designations which 

 the Buddhist historians are supposed to have employed 

 in order txT*mark their contempt for the uncivilised 

 aborigines 4 , in the same manner that the aborigines in 

 the Dekkan were denominated goblins and demons by 

 the Hindus 5 , from the fact that, like the Yakkhos of 

 Ceylon, they too were demon worshippers. The Nagas, 

 another section of the same superstition, worshipped 

 the cobra de capello as an emblem of the destroying 

 power. They appear to have chiefly inhabited the 

 northern and western coasts of Ceylon, as the Yakkhos 

 did the interior 6 ; and, notwithstanding their alleged bar- 

 barism, both had organised some form of government, 

 however rude. 7 The Yakkhos had a capital which they 

 called Lankapura, and the Nagas a king, the possession 

 of whose " throne of gems" 8 was disputed by the rival 

 sovereign of a neighbouring kingdom. So numerous 

 were the followers of this gloomy idolatry of that time 

 in Ceylon, that they gave the name of Nagadipo 9 , the 



B.C. 



543. 



1 See a note at the end of this chap- 

 ter, on the landing ofWij ayo inCeylon, 

 as described in the Mahawanso. 



2 Mahawanso, ch. vii. ; FA HIAX, 

 Foe-koue-ki, ch. xxxvii. 



3 Eajavali, p. 169. 



4 REINATTD, Introd. to Abmdfeda, 

 vol. i. sec. iii. p. ccxvi. See also 

 CLOUGH'S Singhalese Dictionary, vol. 

 ii. p. 2. 



5 MOTTNTSTTJART ELPHINSTONE'S, 



History of India, b. iv. ch. xi. p. 216. 



6 The first descent of Gotama 

 Buddha in Ceylon was amongst the 

 Yakkhos at Bintenne ; in his second 

 visit he converted the " Naga King 

 of Kalany," near Colombo, Maha- 

 wanso, ch. i. p. 5. 



7 FABER, Origin of Idolatry, b. ii. 

 ch. vii. p. 440. 



8 Mahaicanso, ch. i. 



9 TTIRNOTTR was unable to deter- 

 mine the position on the modern 

 map of the ancient territory of Na- 

 gadipo. Introd. p. xxxiv. CASTE 

 CHITTY, in a paper in the Journal of 

 the Ceylon Astatic Society, 1848, p. 71, 

 endeavours to identify it with Jaffna, 

 The Rajaratnqzari places it at the 

 present Kalany, on the river of that 

 name near Colombo (vol. ii. p. 22). 

 The Mahaicanso in many passages 

 alludes to the existence of Naga 

 kingdoms on the continent of India, 

 showing that at that time serpent- 

 worship had not been entirely ex- 

 tinguished by Brahmanism in the 

 Dekkan, and affording an additional 

 ground for conjecture that the first 



