{"id":48718,"date":"2015-10-14T13:54:24","date_gmt":"2015-10-14T20:54:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=48718"},"modified":"2015-10-14T13:54:24","modified_gmt":"2015-10-14T20:54:24","slug":"15101505-510-years-ago-to-date-is-the-day-that-the-portuguese-first-landed-in-colombo-sri-lanka","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2015\/10\/14\/15101505-510-years-ago-to-date-is-the-day-that-the-portuguese-first-landed-in-colombo-sri-lanka\/","title":{"rendered":"15\/10\/1505 (510 years ago to date) is the day that the Portuguese first landed in Colombo, Sri Lanka"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chanaka Bandarage<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

Towards mid October 1505, the Portuguese Naval Captain, Lorenzo De Almeida, aka Don Lorenzo, who manned a fleet of nine war ships, had decided to return to Portugal \u00a0as he could not secure marine rope from the Islands of Maldives or Calcutta in India. Almeida was not aware of the existence of the island nation, Sri Lanka.\u00a0 During the return journey to Portugal, his crew witnessed on the horizon of a land that was lush in vegetation.\u00a0 They decided to sail towards that land, Sri Lanka; and upon arrival therein anchored at the Galle Harbour.<\/p>\n

Two generations prior to this visit, Ven Thotagamuwe Shri\u00a0 Rahula Thero in verse 84 of his Parevi Sandeshaya (\u0db4\u0dbb\u0dd9\u0dc0\u0dd3 \u0dc3\u0d82\u0daf\u0dda\u0dc1\u0dba) described Galle as a place where gems, pearls and gold were displayed in shops in such abundance as if the entire seabed had been mined to secure them.<\/p>\n

While berthed in Galle, minor repairs to the fleet were attended to.\u00a0 The Portuguese managed to secure the required marine rope as well. They procured food and water in large quantities for their new voyage;\u00a0 the destination was Colombo, Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n

While sailing to Colombo the Portuguese were mesmerised with the beauty of the island nation. What they had witnessed in Calcutta was a dry, harsh and a rough land.\u00a0 In contrast, they realised that Sri Lanka was a refreshing, fertile land.\u00a0 They saw whispering palm trees and very much enjoyed the fragrant breeze that blew through them. They could see lush green vegetation everywhere and the beautiful white Buddhist pagodas (dagobas) that appeared on hilltops. The Portuguese were exceptionally happy that they found this beautiful, prosperous island paradise at a time when the fleet was highly demoralised. They could not wait until they reached Colombo.\u00a0 During the voyage, they gave thanks to their God for the finding.<\/p>\n

On 15 October 1505, <\/strong>exactly 510 years to date, the ships anchored at Colombo Harbor.<\/p>\n

The Portuguese observed two Muslim churches in Modera area.\u00a0 They watched young Sinhala children while singing, \u00a0joyfully pulling giant fishing nets to the shore, filled with fish. The Portuguese were surprised that the Colombo Port was full of ships.\u00a0 Among the items \u00a0that were destined to export from Colombo to various parts of the world were tusked elephants, desiccated coconuts, fresh coconuts, cinnamon and valuable \u00a0timber.<\/p>\n

The King, Dharma Parakramabahu, who held the seat in Kotte was quickly \u00a0informed of the arrival of the flotilla of ships that contained the \u2018strange, white skinned sailors\u2019.\u00a0 After obtaining favourable reports about them from his Spy Service, the King agreed to receive the visitors.\u00a0 By this time the fleet had informed the King that the Naval Captain\u00a0 Lorenzo De Almeida was a representative of the King of Portugal and was the son of \u00a0Francisco De Almeida, First Viceroy of the Portuguese India. \u00a0They had sought an audience with the King.\u00a0 While granting the audience, the King through his representative indicated the visitors of his regret for the inconvenience caused to them by the local people who had prevented the Portuguese from collecting water and firewood within the Harbour. \u00a0\u00a0The King also advised that the Portuguese should not have displayed their artillery power to the locals.<\/p>\n

Lorenzo De Almeida\u2019s representative (Farnao Kotrin) was picked up from a ship in the Colombo Harbor and taken to the King\u2019s Palace , using a very circuitous route. It took three full days for the team to reach Kotte. \u00a0In actual fact, it was a one hour journey (hence, the proverb, \u2018\u0db4\u0dbb\u0d82\u0d9c\u0dd2\u0dba\u0dcf \u0d9a\u0ddd\u0da7\u0dca\u0da7\u0dda \u0d9c\u0dd2\u0dba\u0dcf \u0dc0\u0d9c\u0dda\u2019).<\/p>\n

The purpose of taking the circuitous route was to deceive the Portuguese about the Kingdom\u2019s whereabouts.<\/p>\n

During the discussions the Portuguese representative advised the King that they were interested in doing trade and commerce with the King.\u00a0 He stressed that the King must send gifts and pleasantries to the King of Portugal every year, then their King will reciprocate. The Portuguese made a \u2018mild’ threat that if their proposals were not adhered to, they may have to punish the King.\u00a0 The representative indicated that Portugal has one of the most powerful naval fleets in the world and if the King co-operated, they could provide him with protection against enemy forces.<\/p>\n

The Portuguese cunningly stressed that for them Sri Lanka was only a transit point and that their intention was to do extensive business (trade and commerce) with India.<\/p>\n

It was agreed that a Treaty should be entered into between Portugal and the Kotte \u00a0Kingdom in regards to trade and commerce and the provision of naval security to the King. The King and his Ministers (comprised of four of his brothers) were pleased with the Portuguese proposals and indicated of their desire to sign the Treaty immediately.<\/p>\n

According to the Treaty, the Portuguese were allowed to establish Settlements in Colombo and that the Sinhala Kingdom would gift Portugal with a large quantity of cinnamon every year (about 200,000 pounds).<\/p>\n

After entering the Treaty, the Portuguese agent returned to the fleet stationed in the Colombo Harbour.<\/p>\n

Lorenzo De Almeida was extremely thrilled and happy with the outcome, he could not basically believe it.\u00a0 To celebrate, he ordered the firing of several rounds of ships\u2019 artillery into the air. The Colombo residents were so terrified about the gunfire; it was for the first time they had experienced anything like that.\u00a0 They fled their dwellings in large numbers and hid in bushlands.<\/p>\n

Lorenzo De Almeida immediately\u00a0 appointed an Ambassador (Payo De Souza) and wanted to send him to the King with a group of Portuguese men.\u00a0 The King provided elephants for the journey, which again took three days to reach Kotte (by then the Portuguese had realised that the King had tricked them as to the distance, as they could hear the ships\u2019 artillery fire in Kotte).<\/p>\n

The Ambassador had a cordial audience with the King.<\/p>\n

The Ambassador was astonished with the wealth and prosperity of the nation. He could not believe the quantity and the value of the gems, gold and other jewelry that he witnessed at the palace. The King gave a golden memento to the Ambassador. The words therein were inscribed in Sinhala.<\/p>\n

Upon his return to the fleet, the Ambassador\u00a0 was well received by Lorenzo De Almeida.\u00a0 The King\u2019s Sinhala entourage who travelled with the Ambassador were cordially welcomed by him and given a sumptuous meal that included bread and \u00a0red wine.\u00a0 This was the first time that the Sinhalese had consumed such food. First, they thought the Portuguese were eating rocks (bread) and drinking blood (red wine).<\/p>\n

The promised load of cinnamon was loaded to Portuguese ships on the same day.\u00a0 The King gifted two tusked \u00a0calf elephants\u00a0 to be given to the Portuguese King.\u00a0 To consume during their voyage, the King donated them large numbers of live foul, fresh fruit that included bananas, mangoes, pineapple and king coconuts. The Portuguese were authorised to inscribe their country\u2019s Crest and the Christian Cross upon a rock in the Harbour (this inscription is believed to be still preserved in the Harbour). Prior to their departure, the Portuguese were allowed to build a small Catholic church at the same place in the Harbour and conduct a mass there.\u00a0 This should be the first ever Catholic mass to be held in Sri Lanka. Next to the church, the Portuguese were allowed to open a factory and few Portuguese were allowed to live there permanently.<\/p>\n

The fleet when arrived in Lisbon was received as heroes.\u00a0 There was much publicity in the country about their most astonishing achievements.\u00a0 Lorenzo De Almeida was promoted to the rank of Admiral. The tusked elephant (one had died during the journey) was the first ever elephant to set foot in Portugal.<\/p>\n

King Manuel (1495 \u2013 1521), personally attended a mass in Lisbon on 21\/12\/1507 to thank the God for the valuable gift (Sri Lanka) bestowed on \u00a0his nation. He drafted a letter in 1507\u00a0 to Pope Julius II (nicknamed \u2018The Fearsome Pope\u2019 and \u2018The Warrior Pope\u2019\u00a0 (1443 \u2013 1513), informing \u00a0him of the remarkable achievement by his country.<\/p>\n

The Portuguese King ordered that a military Garrison and a Fort be established in Sri Lanka and that his First Viceroy in India should henceforth reside in Sri Lanka.\u00a0 He wanted all Asian operations to be conducted from Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n

The Portuguese King organised a suitable present for his Sri Lankan counterpart.<\/p>\n

The unbelievably friendly relationship between the two nations lasted only a few months.<\/p>\n

The Portuguese interrupted and searched ships that carried cargo from Colombo to other nations (mainly Muslim ships).\u00a0 Thus, the Sinhala and Muslim merchants despised the Portuguese.<\/p>\n

Christianization of people by the Portuguese and damage caused to Buddhism \u00a0furthered the Sinhala friction with the Portuguese.<\/p>\n

In 1518 the Portuguese were permitted to build a Fort in \u00a0Colombo and they were given further trading concessions.<\/p>\n

When King Dharma Parakramabahu died in 1519, the Portuguese had firmly established their footprint in Sri Lanka. Dharma Parkarambahu\u2019s brother, Wijeya Parakramabahu (Vijayabahu of Vijeyaba Kollaya fame) took over the reins and ruled the country until 1521.<\/p>\n

In 1521 three sons of Vijayabahu, put their father to death and partitioned the kingdom amongst themselves. The oldest of the brothers, Buvanekabahu, ruled at Kotte, and the two others set up independent kingdoms at Sitawaka and Rayigama. Mayadunne, the King of Sitawaka, was an ambitious and able ruler who sought to expand his frontier at the expense of his brother at Kotte. Buvanekabahu could not resist the temptation of seeking Portuguese assistance. The Portuguese were eager to help the King, and the more he was pressed by Mayadunne, the greater was his reliance upon them. Buvanekabahu defended his kingdom against Mayadunne, who in turn allied himself with the Zamorin of Calicut (in India), an inveterate enemy of the Portuguese.<\/p>\n

Buvanekabahu was succeeded by his grandson Prince Dharmapala (Don Juan Dharmapala, 1541 \u2013 1597), who was even more dependent on Portuguese for support. An agreement between Buvanekabahu and the King of Portugal in 1543 guaranteed the protection of the Prince on the throne and the defence of the Kingdom; in return the Portuguese were to be confirmed that they would receive all of their privileges and the tributes of cinnamon. The Prince was educated by Franciscans; in 1557, when his conversion to Christianity was announced, he \u00a0had become nothing more than a Portuguese prot\u00e9g\u00e9 .<\/p>\n

Fierce battles erupted between the Sinhalese and the Portuguese in Mayadunne\u2019 s kingdom.\u00a0 His son, Rajasinha, continued with the ferocious battles on land.<\/p>\n

The Sinhala Kings failed because they had no way of combating the Portuguese sea power.<\/p>\n

The Portuguese captured the whole of Kotte and conquested the surrounding Sinhalese kingdoms as well (Dharmapala , the Portuguese puppet,\u00a0 was only a name sake \u00a0King (from 1551 to\u00a0 1597).\u00a0 He was the first and only Christian King of Sri Lanka.\u00a0 His wife – Dona Catherina, later married Konappu Bandara, who became the King of Kandy in the name, Vimaladharmasuriya (\u200e1592\u20131604).<\/p>\n

In 1565 their capital\u00a0 was moved from Kotte to Colombo.<\/p>\n

The battles of Mulleriyawa (1559) and Danthure (1594) were turning points in the indigenous resistance to Portuguese expansion.\u00a0 In Danthure, for the first time in Sri Lanka an entire Portuguese army of many thousands was completely annihilated (according to \u2018\u0dbb\u0dcf\u0da2\u0dcf\u0dc0\u0dbd\u0dd2\u0dba\u2019, the Portuguese death total was 20,000), when they were just a fraction away from the total conquest of the island.\u00a0 The Danthure battle was led by the King of Kandy, Vimaladharmasuriya.<\/p>\n

The Portuguese were finally chased away, in 1658, after fierce battles with the Dutch.<\/p>\n

Unlike the British (1798- 1948), the Portuguese did \u00a0very little to improve the country\u2019s economy. Their legacy was the endowment of Catholism to the country.\u00a0 No doubt that endowment is a blessing to the hundreds and thousands of Catholics living in the country. \u00a0But, the manner in which Catholism was introduced by the Portuguese \u00a0was contrary to the noble Christian principles. The Portuguese burnt down Buddhist temples, pirivenas, and libraries and Catholism was basically forcibly imposed upon the coastal \u00a0Buddhists. Lots of inducements were given to people who converted themselves from Buddhism to Catholicism; and to those who took \u00a0up Portuguese names. For example, such converts were exempted from paying taxes that were payable by all subjects to the Portuguese Government.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Facts to write this article were obtained from the book \u2018\u0dbd\u0d82\u0d9a\u0dcf\u0dc0: <\/em>\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>\u0db4\u0dd8\u0dad\u0dd4\u0d9c\u0dd3\u0dc3\u0dd3 <\/em>\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>\u0dba\u0dd4\u0d9c\u0dba<\/em>\u2018 \u00a0by Abehya Hewawasam; and \u00a0from other reputed sources including \u2018\u0db8\u0dc4\u0dcf\u0dc0\u0d82\u0dc1\u0dba\u2019 \u00a0and \u2018\u0dbb\u0dcf\u0da2\u0dcf\u0dc0\u0dbd\u0dd2\u0dba<\/em>\u2019<\/em>.<\/p>\n

15\/10\/2015<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chanaka Bandarage Towards mid October 1505, the Portuguese Naval Captain, Lorenzo De Almeida, aka Don Lorenzo, who manned a fleet of nine war ships, had decided to return to Portugal \u00a0as he could not secure marine rope from the Islands of Maldives or Calcutta in India. Almeida was not aware of the existence of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[88],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-48718","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chanaka-bandarage"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48718"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48718\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}