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... Sinhalese kingdom centred at Anuradhapura in Sri Lanka. Though plagued by invasions from southern India (which took actual control of the kingdom several times) and internal strife among warring clans, the kingdom of Anuradhapura developed a high degree of culture. Its complex irrigation system is often considered its major achievement. The modern city of Anuradhapura ...

city in Ceylon and administrative center of North Central Province. The population of Anuradhapura was 29,400 in 1963. It has a railway station and is situated at a highway junction. It is the center of an important rice-growing region and also a site of Buddhist pilgrimages.Ancient Anuradhapura (fifth century B.C. To ...

Theravada Buddhist monastic center built at Anuradhapura, then capital of Ceylon, by King Vattagamani Abhaya (r. 29–17 BC). Originally associated with the nearby Mahavihara (“Great Monastery”), it soon seceded in a dispute over the relations between monks and the lay ...

... the fall (late 8th cent.) of Anuradhapura. The city reached its height under the rule of king Parakrama Bahu I (1164–97), the last notable monarch of the Sinhalese dynasty. He embellished the capital with temples, stupas, and huge stone images of Buddha; among these is a famous colossal statue of the recumbent Buddha. Pollonarrua fell to the Hindu Tamils in the 13th ...

a settlement in northeastern Sri Lanka; it is situated near Anuradhapura. After the fall of Anuradhapura in the Middle Ages, Polonnaruwa became the capital of the second Sinhalese state and the center of Sinhalese civilization. The state flourished in the 12th century, at which time large temples and palaces were built in ...