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Mahailuppallama Buddha Statue (මහඉලුප්පල්ලම බුදු පිළිමය)

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Mahailuppallama Buddha Statue (මහඉලුප්පල්ලම බුදු පිළිමය) — Mahailuppallama Buddha Statue

With the introduction of the image house and the consequent ritual worship, the production of the Buddha images in stone, brick and clay as well as in metal, seems to have proliferated particularly between the 3^rd – 10^th centuries. These have been sculptured in all three attitudes – seated, standing, and recumbent.

A standing Buddha image 1.78 meters in height of Amaravati marble, discovered from Mahailluppallama is now in the Anuradhapura Museum. When building a model farm on a land belonging to the Agriculture Faculty, University of Peradeniya, the bulldozer used for levelling the land hit the statue which lay buried for centuries on the 23rd of March, 1946. Senarath Paranavitana, who was then the Archaeological Commissioner decided to leave the statue at the site at the request of the villagers (Bopearachchi, 2012).

A modern shrine (now named Mahailuppallama Rajamaha Viharaya) was built to house the statue. However tasteless restorations with cement and the application of modern paint, together with the most unfortunate installation inside a modern structure, have virtually destroyed this important image by leaving it at the site (Bopearachchi, 2012).

Paranavitana assumed that this Buddha image, about 1.78 m. in height and carved out of white marble, had been fashioned in Andhradesa and brought to the island by traders or pilgrims. At that time it was believed that this marble was not found in this country (Bopearachchi, 2012).

It is true that the proportion found in an image made by Sinhalese craftsmen are absent in this, but fragments of this type of image are found in the Jaffna Museum and also in the Kataragama Archaeological Museum. Those at the Kataragama museum were unearthed from the premises of Girihandu Seya Rajamaha VIharaya at Ambalantota. Since similar fragments have been found in the northern, north-central and southern regions of Sri Lanka it may be surmised that they were the creations of a certain school of craftsmen (Wijeseekera, 1990).

Dr. Siri Gunasinghe also endorses this idea thus: “We can conclude that around the second century CE, a group of Sri Lankan monks resided in a monastery built in Nagarjunkonda according to their specifications.

In this monastery known as the Sinhala Vihara, there was an image house too. This image house and the other objects associated with it undoubtedly reveal that the monks who resided there went there from the Abhayagiri vihara where image worship was very popular. Along with them, those monks would have carried the practice of worshipping Buddha images and the entire art of carving Buddha images. Through their influence, during the second and third centuries, a number of images were built in Amaravati and Nagarjunkonda (Wijeseekera, 1990)..

A poor attempt has been made to rebuild the missing right hand of the original statue recently. Unfortunately, the recent restoration has assigned the wrong mudra. The missing right hand may have been upheld in Abaya Mudra. The missing left hand holds the hem of the outer robe (sanghati), near the chest.

References

Wijeseekera, N. (1990) in Archaeological Department Centenary (1890-1990) – Volume 4 : Sculpture . Sri Lanka: Department of Archeology (Commemorative Series).
Wikramagamage, C., 2004. Heritage of Rajarata: Major natural, cultural, and historic sites. Colombo. Central Bank of Sri Lanka. p.140.
Bopearachchi, O. (2012) “Andhra-Tamilnadu and Sri Lanka”: Early Buddhist Sculptures of Sri Lanka.

Also See

Map of Location of Mahailuppallama Rajamaha Viharaya

Please click on the button below to load the Dynamic Google Map (ගූගල් සිතියම් පහලින්)

Show Location (ගූගල් සිතියම)

The map above also shows other places of interest within a approximately 20 km radius of the current site. Click on any of the markers and the info box to take you to information of these sites

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Driving Directions to Mahailuppallama Rajamaha Viharaya

Route from Colombo to Mahailuppallama Rajamaha Viharaya

Through : Wattala – Minuwangoda – Diwulapitiya – Giriulla – Dambadeniya
Distance : 66 km
Travel Time : 1.45 hours
Driving Directions : see on google maps

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References

Also See

Map of Location of Mahailuppallama Rajamaha Viharaya

Driving Directions to Mahailuppallama Rajamaha Viharaya

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