Kingdom of Kandy

Kingdom of Kandy
මහනුවර රාජධානිය
Mahanuwara Rajadhaniya
1469–1815
Flag of
  Territorial extent of the Kingdom of Kandy (1689–1796)
  Dutch-controlled areas
CapitalKandy
Common languagesSinhala (court language 1469–1815 and dynastic language 1469–1739)
Tamil (court and dynastic language 1739–1815)
Pali (for religious purposes)
Religion
Theravada Buddhism, Hinduism
GovernmentMonarchy
Monarch 
• 1469–1511
Senasammata Vikramabahu (first)
• 1798–1815
Sri Vikrama Rajasinha (last)
Historical eraKandyan period
• Foundation of Senkadagalapura
1469
• Conquest by Sitawaka
1581
• Ascension of Vimaladharmasuriya I
1592
2–18 March 1815
Preceded by
Succeeded by
Kingdom of Sitawaka
British Ceylon

The Kingdom of Kandy was a monarchy on the island of Sri Lanka, located in the central and eastern portion of the island. It was founded in the late 15th century and endured until the early 19th century.[1]

Initially a client kingdom of the Kingdom of Kotte, Kandy gradually established itself as an independent force during the tumultuous 16th and 17th centuries, allying at various times with the Jaffna Kingdom, the Madurai Nayak dynasty of South India, Sitawaka Kingdom, and the Dutch colonizers to ensure its survival.[2]

Throughout the 16th century, numerous battles were fought with the Portuguese and later the Dutch, and from the 1590s, Kandy became the sole independent native polity on the island of Sri Lanka and through a combination of hit-and-run tactics and diplomacy kept European colonial forces at bay in the central highlands, before finally falling under British colonial rule in 1818.

The kingdom was absorbed into the British Empire as a protectorate following the Kandyan Convention of 1815, and definitively lost its autonomy following the Uva Rebellion of 1817.

  1. ^ Johnston, William M. (2013). Encyclopedia of Monasticism. Routledge. p. 707. ISBN 978-1136787164.
  2. ^ Enemy lines: childhood, warfare, and play in Batticaloa, p. 40, Margaret Trawick, University of California Press, 2007, ISBN 978-0-520-24516-7

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