4G6 



SCIENCES AND SOCIAL ARTS. 



[PART IV. 



rounded it by a rampart, the figures of lions with which 

 he decorated it, obtained for it the name of Sihagiri, 

 the "Lion-rock." But the real defences of Sigiri were 

 its precipitous cliffs, and its naturally scarped walls, 

 which it was not necessary to strengthen by any artificial 

 structures. 



Their rocky hills, and the almost impenetrable forests 

 that enveloped them, were in every age the chief security 

 of the Singhalese ; and so late as the 12th century, the 

 inscription engraved on the rock at Dambool, in de- 

 scribing the strength of the national defences under the 

 King Kirti Mssanga, enumerates the " strongholds in 

 the midst of forests, those upon steep hills, and the 

 fastnesses surrounded by water." 1 



Thorn-gates. The device, retained down to the 

 period of the capture of Kandy by the British, when 

 the passes into the hill country were defended by thick 

 plantations of formidable thorny trees, appears to have 

 prevailed in the earliest times. The protection of Ma- 

 helo, a town assailed by Dutugaimunu, B.C. 162, consist- 

 ing in its being " surrounded on all sides with the thorny 

 dadambo creeper, within which was a triple line of 

 fortifications." 2 



Bridges. As to bridges, Ceylon had none till the 

 end of the 13th century 3 , and Tumour conjectures 

 that even then they were only formed of timber, 

 like the Pons Sublicius at Eome. At a later period stone 

 pillars were used in pairs, on which beams or slabs were 



1 TTJEXOTJU'S Epitome and Appen- 

 dix, p. 95. 



2 Mahawanso, ch. xxv. p. 153. 

 When Albuquerque attacked Ma- 

 lacca in A.D. 1511, the chief who 

 defended the place "covered the 

 streets with poisoned thorns, to gore 

 the Portuguese coming in." FAEIA 



Y SOTTZA, vol. i. p. 180. VALENTTIf, 

 in speaking of the dominions of the 

 King of Kandy during the Duteh 

 occupation of the Low Country, de- 

 scribes the density of the forests, 

 " which not only serve to divide the 



earldoms one from another, but, above 

 all, tend to the fortification of the 

 country, on which account no one 

 dare, on pain of death, to thin or root 

 out a tree, more than to permit a 

 passage for one man at a time, it 

 being impossible to pass through the 

 rest thereof." VALEXTYN, Oud en 

 Nieuw Oost-Indien, $-c., ch. i. p. 22. 

 Kxox gives a curious account of 

 these " thorn-gates." (Part ii. ch. vi. 

 p. 45.) 



3 TUEXOTJR'S Epitome and Notes, 

 p. 72. Major Forbes says, however, 



