by Max Planck Society Courtesy phys.org Microliths—small stone tools—are often interpreted as being part of composite tools, including projectile weapons, and essential to efficient hunting strategies of Homo sapiens. In Europe and Africa, the earliest appearance of these lithic toolkits are linked to hunting medium and large-sized animals in grassland or woodland settings, or as adaptations to […]

By IAN RANDALL FOR MAILONLINE Archaeologists studied tiny, worked stone tools found in the Fa-Hein Lena Cave They believe they were made during the production of projectiles like spears Ancient humans likely used them to hunt tree-dwelling animals like monkeys These early tools overturn the idea that rainforests impeded humanity’s spread PUBLISHED: 19:00, 2 October 2019 | UPDATED: 19:00, 2 October […]

BY S VENKAT NARAYAN, Courtesy The Island NEW DELHI, September 7: A newly published archaeological study based on DNA analysis of skeletal remains at the Rakhigarhi site in Haryana in north India has claimed that inhabitants of the Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC) were a distinct indigenous people, and challenges the theory of an “Aryan invasion” ending […]

Courtesy News18 Civil Aviation Authority vice-chairman Shashi Danatunge said they had irrefutable facts to prove that Ravana was the pioneer and the first to fly using an aircraft. Bengaluru: The Sri Lankan government believes that King Ravana was the first aviator in the world and flew over 5,000 years ago and the country’s Civil Aviation Authority […]

Martin Brech Courtesy  The INSTITUTE FOR HISTORICAL REVIEW In October 1944, at age eighteen, I was drafted into the U.S. army. Largely because of the “Battle of the Bulge,” my training was cut short, my furlough was halved, and I was sent overseas immediately. Upon arrival in Le Havre, France, we were quickly loaded into […]

Japanese Agency Truth of Japan’s World War II Why did Japan have to fight? What did Japan fight for? Japan is the first Asian country that has amazingly modernized and defeated one of Great Western powers, Russian Empire. This brought huge hope to many Asian countries that were suffering from Western colonization. Who else in […]

By P.K.Balachandran/Daily Mirror Courtesy NewsIn.Asia The successful launching of the first Sri Lankan-designed satellite ‘Raavana-1’ on June 17, established the capabilities of two young Lankan engineers, Tharindu Dayaratne and Dulani Chamika. Tharindu Dayaratne is an electrical and electronics engineer of the University of Peradeniya and a research engineer at the Arthur C Clarke Institute for […]

Sri Lanka Raavana, the ancient Lankan monarch who is known to have excelled in technology, aviation, medicine, state craft and music. Ravana is considered to be a descendant of Yakka clan in ancient Sri Lanka and the ancient dynasty of  Sinhala people in Sri Lanka . Name “Yakka” believed to be derived from the Sinhala […]

Royal Asiatic Society of Sri Lanka (RASSL) Royal Asiatic Society of Sri Lanka (RASSL) Public Lecture  Did Japan contribute to Sri Lanka and India gaining independence from British colonial rule?”    by Senaka Weeraratna   On Monday 24th  June 2019 at 5.00 p.m. at the Gamini Dissanayake Auditorium No. 96, Ananda Coomaraswamy Mawatha, Colombo 07 ALL ARE WELCOME […]

Courtesy  Internationalist Communist Forum Introduction To the British public, Sri Lanka is probably best known for idyllic photos in package tour brochures describing it as the “Pearl of the Indian Ocean”. But for a large part of its population, the island is anything but idyllic. For half a century, it has been plagued by on-going […]

Dr. Daya Hewavitharana. Nalanda was the first residential university in the history of the world. The Nalanda campus was an exceptionally impressive place, which included many impressive chetiyas, temples, monasteries, hostels, lecture halls, meditation halls, libraries, even parkland with lakes. The three great libraries of Nalanda were: Ratnasagara, Ratnadadhi and Ratnaranjaka. Inscriptional evidence (Yasovarmadeva) reveals that […]

By Senaka Weeraratna  Royal Asiatic Society of Sri Lanka (RASSL) Public Lecture  Did Japan contribute to Sri Lanka and India gaining independence from British colonial rule?”   by Senaka Weeraratna   On Monday 29th April 2019 at 5.00 p.m. at the Gamini Dissanayake Auditorium No. 96, Ananda Coomaraswamy Mawatha, Colombo 07 ALL ARE WELCOME Abstract The time has come […]

PBS Hemachandra Lieutenant Commander (retired) Sri Lanka Navy Courtesy The Island Carbon dating of the bone samples collected from the Mannar Mass grave in Sri Lanka confirmed that bone samples belonged to the periods when Sri Lanka was ruled by European. Books written by Portuguese, Dutch and English historians recorded massacres of Singhalese people lived […]

by Shashi Tharoor Courtesy RT Screenshot from film Gandhi (1982); Director Richard Attenborough; International Film Investors; National Film Development Corporation of India (NFDC); Goldcrest Films International; Indo-British; Carolina Bank The centenary of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre is the right occasion for Britain to apologise for the evils of colonialism. Two years ago, on the UK […]

by P. WEERASEKERA Courtesy The Island The issue of mass graves in Mannar continues to remain an inconclusive hot topic, despite the radio carbon dating analysis report received from the Beta Analytic Testing Laboratory in Florida, USA., which cleared the Sri Lanka Army of responsibility, by declaring the skeletal remains referred to the Laboratory pre-dates […]

Harindra Dunuwille Much has been said and written about the Kandyan Convention of 1815 whereby the Kandyan Kingdom was ceded to the British. Historians and writers have over the years interpreted the events that led to the signing and the cessation of what was the last bastion of Sinhale”. The document itself, its drafting, its […]

by Senaka Weeraratna (This is an edited version of a paper read out at a Public Seminar on the ‘ Kandyan Convention of 1815’ held at the University of Peradeniya, Arts Theatre, on March 09, 2019) The Kandyan Convention (‘Ingrisy – Sinhale Givisuma’) must be examined in the context of British colonial policy seeking British supremacy […]

By Virginia Morell  Courtesy sciencemag.org If you picture early humans dining, you likely imagine them sitting down to a barbecue of mammoth, aurochs, and giant elk meat. But in the rainforests of Sri Lanka, where our ancestors ventured about 45,000 years ago, people hunted more modest fare, primarily monkeys and tree squirrels. Then they turned the bones of […]

john hawks weblog Fascinating: Ancient humans hunted monkeys for tens of thousands of years”. If you picture early humans dining, you likely imagine them sitting down to a barbecue of mammoth, aurochs, and giant elk meat. But in the rainforests of Sri Lanka, where our ancestors ventured about 45,000 years ago, people hunted more modest fare, […]

By Jane Recker SMITHSONIAN.COM After analyzing nearly 15,000 animal remains in Sri Lanka, scientists found humans used carved stone and bone fragments to hunt small game The gray tufted langur was a favorite target for the early humans of Fa Hien Cave in Sri Lanka. (USO / iStock) Early humans were capable of hunting small mammals like monkeys […]

by Senaka Weeraratna (Attorney – at – Law) Sri Lanka together with several other Asian countries owe much in winning their freedom, to Japan’s entry to the Second World War and the resulting chain of events that sealed the fate of European colonialism in Asia. Jawaharlal Nehru, the Indian Prime Minister (1947 – 1964) when asked in […]

ප්‍රවීණ මාධ්‍යවේදී උපාලි සමරසිංහ විසින් රචිත ‘‘මහ රජ ගැමුණු ජයමග ඔස්සේ’’ කෘතිය පසුගිය 10 වන දින කොළඹ 07 නිදහස් මාවතේ ජාතික පුස්තකාල හා ප්‍රලේඛන සේවා මණ්ඩලයේ දී ජන ගත කෙරිණ. මැටරඹ හේමරතන නාහිමිපාණන් මෙම උත්සවයේ මුලසුන හෙබවූ අතර පුරාවිද්‍යා චක්‍රවර්තී එල්ලාවල මේධානන්ද හිමි සහ මහාචාර්ය රාජ් සෝමදේව, ජ්‍යෙෂ්ඨ කථිකාචාර්ය අත්තනායක එම්. හේරත් යන මහත්වරු දෙසුම් […]

Courtesy the conversation.com The history of the spice trade conjures up exotic images of caravans plying the Silk Road in storied antiquity as well as warfare between European powers vying for control of what, pound for pound, were among the most valuable commodities in the known world. One of the most valuable of the spices […]

 තිලකා රන්දෙනි  උපුටා ගැන්ම දිවයින අද සීගිරියේ ඇති බොහෝ චිත‍්‍ර මැකී ගොසිනි. ඒ නිසාම ඒ යුගය ගැන එතරම් පැහැදිලි රූපයක් මවාගත නොහැකිය. එහෙත් චිත‍්‍ර මැකී ගිය ද එක්තරා වාසනාවකට සීගිරි ගී තවමත් කැටපත් පවුරේ ඇත. යම් යම් ලේඛකයෝ වරින් වර තම තම නැණ පමණින් ඒවා විග‍්‍රහ කරති. මේ ගී විග‍්‍රහයන් අඩංගු පොත් දෙකක් හා මෝහන ප‍්‍රතිගමනයක් […]

ලිලානි සුරවීර  (FB) ක්‍රි.ව. 1815 දී උඩරට රාජධානිය ඉංග්‍රීසීන්ට යටත් වීමට හේතු වූ ප්‍රධාන කාරණයක්‌ වූයේ එවකට උඩරට සිටි ප්‍රධානීන් බලලෝභයෙන් භේදභින්න වී කටයුතු කිරීමය. ඔවුහු පසුව ඉංග්‍රීසීන් උඩරටට ගෙන්වා ගෙන ගිවිසුමක්‌ ද අත්සන් කරමින් උඩරට පාලන බලය බ්‍රිතාන්‍ය අධිරාජ්‍යයට පැවරුවෝය. එතැන් පටන් ඉංග්‍රීසීන් විසින් ගෙන ගිය පාලනය උඩරට රදළයන් බලාපොරොත්තු නොවූ එසේම රදළයන්ට අවාසි […]

By Lakshman I. Keerthisinghe Courtesy Ceylon Today The thing worse than rebellion is the thing that causes rebellion – Frederick Douglass -American Author Around two centuries ago our ancestors launched a heroic struggle against the mighty British Empire in an uprising in order to gain freedom from British colonial rule. Reminiscences of that struggle still haunt […]

By Senaka Weeraratna, Categories: Greater East Asian Conference ,Greater East Asian War (Pacific War) ,Japanese History (Culture) Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbour ignited the liberation of Asia from Western domination – Time to express Asia’s Gratitude to Japan bySenaka Weeraratna Attorney at Law (Sri Lanka) Good Afternoon. Ladies and Gentlemen. Thank you for inviting me to speak to you […]

Key-note address delivered at the University, Peradeniya, Kandy By Dr. Palitha Kohona, Former Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Sri Lanka to the United Nations, Former Foreign Secretary  26 November 2018 Today we look back on a heroic struggle that our ancestors waged 200 years ago   against the mightiest empire that the world had known up […]

by  Senaka Weeraratna Attorney at Law (Sri Lanka) Good Afternoon.  Ladies and Gentlemen. Thank you for inviting me to speak to you today. The title of my presentation is ‘Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbour ignited the liberation of Asia from Western domination – Time to Express Asia`s Gratitude to Japan`.  This is a very important topic […]

Bhanu Sridharan Courtesy scroll.in A study shows Sri Lanka’s dry zone lizards are also found in India, but its wet zone species are endemic. The Indian termite hill gecko. | Prashanthns/Wikimedia Commons [Licensed under CC BY 3.0   Most households in South Asia would have at some point given shelter to the common house gecko Hemidactylus frenatus. […]