Abstract:
Significance of the Indian Ocean studies for understanding long distance maritime contaptsJn
the pre-modem world has long been established. Though, Sri Lanka is a tiny island in the
Indian Ocean, its historical and cultural evolution has been extremely important for
comparative studies of maritime contacts because of the island’s strategic location at the
southern extremity of the Indian subcontinent and in the middle of the Indian Ocean where
one of the major trans-oceanic naval routes operated. This geographical positioning with
numerous safe and natural harbours along the island’s coastline as well as natural
commodities such hs pearls, precious stones, spices, and tortoise that are highly valued in
western markets and ‘Theravada Buddhism’ drew migrants, merchants, missionaries, scholars
and invaders to the Island. Such migrations from prehistoric times and cultural and trade
contacts with the shores of East Africa, Southwest Asia, South Asia and the Far East have
very strongly influenced the shaping the island’s cultural matrix and its identity. Its
geographical positioning was considered crucial in the power balance and control of trade and
commerce in the Indian Ocean. These various cultural and commercial exchanges which were
reciprocal in nature have left lasting imprints on the nation.
Though the earliest settlements so far recorded in the island are dated to 125,000-75,000 BP,
the first clear archaeological evidence of maritime contacts is believed to be the proto-historic
early Iron Age cultural remains dated to the end of the second millennium BC. They are
mostly recorded from the areas close to the northern and the north-western coast, and South
Indian migrations are said to have played a pivotal role in the introduction of these iron using
cultures. From about the middle of the first millennium BC the archaeological and historical
evidence is clearer about the contacts with the cultures beyond the immediately contiguous
coastal regions of the South Asian subcontinent, particularly with northern India. Subsequent
centuries saw an increasing navigational traffic in the Indian Ocean linking the east with the
west through coastal and transoceanic sea routes. Sri Lankan and other eastern and western historical sources and the archaeological findings recount the role Sri Lanka played in these
commercial and cultural contacts.
Though historical sources on such sea contacts of ancient Sri Lanka are already exhausted,
archaeological evidence is yet to be objectively examined. Therefore this research paper aims
at tracing maritime contacts from an Archaeological perspective and to determine the impact
of such interactions on the developments of the Island’s cultural trajectory. It will also attempt
to re-examine the established theoretical paradigms of sea contacts of ancient Sri Lanka.
Recent archaeological findings particularly from the maritime regions of the Island will be
interwoven with those of historical sources in drawing conclusions in this paper.