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Irrigation Works In Ancient Sri Lanka
irrigation works in ancient Sri Lanka, the earliest dating from about 300 BCE, in the reign of King Pandukabhaya and under continuous development for the next thousand years, were some of the most complex irrigation systems of the ancient world. In addition to constructing underground canals, the Sinhalese were among the first to build completely artificial reservoirs to store water. The system was extensively restored and further extended during the reign of King Parākramabāhu (1153–1186 CE). According to Sri Lankan history, the first tank was built by King Pandukabhaya, who reigned from 437 to 367 BC. It is said that he had three tanks built, namely ''Abhaya wewa'', ''Gamini wewa'', and ''Jaya wewa'', yet, presently, only one tank named ''Basawakkulama wewa'', which is known as the Abhaya wewa in the past, can be identified. After King Pandukabhaya, King Parakramabahu I had many tanks built, with one large tank called ''Parakrama samudraya'' still providing water for agr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Parākramabāhu
Parākramabāhu I ( Sinhala: මහා පරාක්රමබාහු, 1123–1186), or Parakramabahu the Great, was the king of Polonnaruwa from 1153 to 1186. He oversaw the expansion and beautification of his capital, constructed extensive irrigation systems, reorganised the country's army, reformed Buddhist practices, encouraged the arts and undertook military campaigns in South India and Burma. The adage "Not even a little water that comes from the rain must not flow into the ocean without being made useful to man" is one of his most famous utterances. In 1140, Parakramabahu following the death of his uncle, Kitti Sri Megha, Prince of Dakkinadesa, ascended the throne of Dakkhinadesa. Over the next decade, improved both Dakkhinadesi infrastructure and military. Following a protracted civil war, he secured power over the entire island around 1153 and remained in this position until his death in 1186. During Parākramabāhu's reign, he launched a punitive campaign against ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Economic History Of Sri Lanka
The free-market economy of Sri Lanka was worth $84 billion by nominal gross domestic product (GDP) in 2019 and $296.959 billion by purchasing power parity (PPP). The country had experienced an annual growth of 6.4 percent from 2003 to 2012, well above its regional peers. This growth was driven by the growth of non-tradable sectors, which the World Bank warned to be both unsustainable and unequitable. Growth has slowed since then. In 2019 with an income per capita of 13,620 PPP Dollars or 3,852 (2019) nominal US dollars, Sri Lanka was re-classified as a lower middle income nation by the World Bank from a previous upper middle income status. Sri Lanka has met the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) target of halving extreme poverty and is on track to meet most of the other MDGs, outperforming other South Asian countries. Sri Lanka's poverty headcount index was 4.1% by 2016. Since the end of the three-decade-long Sri Lankan Civil War, Sri Lanka has begun focusing on long-term strategi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tank Cascade System
The tank cascade system, or ''wewa-ellangava'' system, is an ancient Sri Lankan irrigation infrastructure. The system is a network of small tanks draining to large reservoirs that store rainwater and surface runoff for later use. Originating in the 1st millennium BCE, the system was designated a Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization in 2017. Centralized bureaucratic management of large-scale systems was implemented from the 3rd to the 13th centuries. Geography The tank cascade system is largely located in the semi-arid north-central section of the island, which experiences equatorial heat, limited freshwater, and erratic rainfall patterns. Minimal groundwater storage capacity, high evaporation, and low or variable precipitation thanks to the monsoon cycle "in this hard rock region meant that no stable human settlement would have been possible without recourse to the storage of surface water in small tanks." Gran ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Irrigation And Water Management
Irrigation (also referred to as watering) is the practice of applying controlled amounts of water to land to help grow crops, landscape plants, and lawns. Irrigation has been a key aspect of agriculture for over 5,000 years and has been developed by many cultures around the world. Irrigation helps to grow crops, maintain landscapes, and revegetate disturbed soils in dry areas and during times of below-average rainfall. In addition to these uses, irrigation is also employed to protect crops from frost, suppress weed growth in grain fields, and prevent soil consolidation. It is also used to cool livestock, reduce dust, dispose of sewage, and support mining operations. Drainage, which involves the removal of surface and sub-surface water from a given location, is often studied in conjunction with irrigation. There are several methods of irrigation that differ in how water is supplied to plants. Surface irrigation, also known as gravity irrigation, is the oldest form of irrigation ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henry Parker (author)
Henry Parker (1849–unknown) was a British engineer in colonial Ceylon during the Victorian era. He was attached to the Irrigation Department from 1873 to 1904. During his work as an engineer he developed an admiration for the skills displayed by the ancient Sinhalese at the time of the construction of their reservoirs. Parker is renowned for having studied and compiled the folklore of Sri Lanka, becoming an authority on the subject. He was the author of tw ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Common Era
Common Era (CE) and Before the Common Era (BCE) are year notations for the Gregorian calendar (and its predecessor, the Julian calendar), the world's most widely used calendar era. Common Era and Before the Common Era are alternatives to the original Anno Domini (AD) and Before Christ (BC) notations used for the same calendar era. The two notation systems are numerically equivalent: " CE" and "AD " each describe the current year; "400 BCE" and "400 BC" are the same year. The expression traces back to 1615, when it first appeared in a book by Johannes Kepler as the la, annus aerae nostrae vulgaris (), and to 1635 in English as " Vulgar Era". The term "Common Era" can be found in English as early as 1708, and became more widely used in the mid-19th century by Jewish religious scholars. Since the later 20th century, BCE and CE have become popular in academic and scientific publications because BCE and CE are religiously neutral terms. They are used by others who wish to be sensi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Water
Water (chemical formula ) is an inorganic, transparent, tasteless, odorless, and nearly colorless chemical substance, which is the main constituent of Earth's hydrosphere and the fluids of all known living organisms (in which it acts as a solvent). It is vital for all known forms of life, despite not providing food, energy or organic micronutrients. Its chemical formula, H2O, indicates that each of its molecules contains one oxygen and two hydrogen atoms, connected by covalent bonds. The hydrogen atoms are attached to the oxygen atom at an angle of 104.45°. "Water" is also the name of the liquid state of H2O at standard temperature and pressure. A number of natural states of water exist. It forms precipitation in the form of rain and aerosols in the form of fog. Clouds consist of suspended droplets of water and ice, its solid state. When finely divided, crystalline ice may precipitate in the form of snow. The gaseous state of water is steam or water vap ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sigiriya Moat 2011
Sigiriya or Sinhagiri (''Lion Rock'' si, සීගිරිය, ta, சிகிரியா/சிங்ககிரி, pronounced see-gi-ri-yə) is an ancient rock fortress located in the northern Matale District near the town of Dambulla in the Central Province, Sri Lanka. It is a site of historical and archaeological significance that is dominated by a massive column of rock approximately high. According to the ancient Sri Lankan chronicle the ''Cūḷavaṃsa'', this area was a large forest, then after storms and landslides it became a hill and was selected by King Kashyapa (AD 477–495) for his new capital. He built his palace on top of this rock and decorated its sides with colourful frescoes. On a small plateau about halfway up the side of this rock he built a gateway in the form of an enormous lion. The name of this place is derived from this structure; ''Sīnhāgiri'', the Lion Rock (an etymology similar to ''Sinhapura'', the Sanskrit name of Singapore, the Lion ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sinhalese People
Sinhalese people ( si, සිංහල ජනතාව, Sinhala Janathāva) are an Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group native to the island of Sri Lanka. They were historically known as Hela people ( si, හෙළ). They constitute about 75% of the Sri Lankan population and number more than 16.2 million. The Sinhalese identity is based on language, cultural heritage and nationality. The Sinhalese people speak Sinhala, an insular Indo-Aryan language, and are predominantly Theravada Buddhists, although a minority of Sinhalese follow branches of Christianity and other religions. Since 1815, they were broadly divided into two respective groups: The 'Up-country Sinhalese' in the central mountainous regions, and the 'Low-country Sinhalese' in the coastal regions; although both groups speak the same language, they are distinguished as they observe different cultural customs. According to the Mahavamsa and the Dipavamsa, a third–fifth century treatise written in Pali ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Canal
Canals or artificial waterways are waterways or engineered channels built for drainage management (e.g. flood control and irrigation) or for conveyancing water transport vehicles (e.g. water taxi). They carry free, calm surface flow under atmospheric pressure, and can be thought of as artificial rivers. In most cases, a canal has a series of dams and locks that create reservoirs of low speed current flow. These reservoirs are referred to as ''slack water levels'', often just called ''levels''. A canal can be called a ''navigation canal'' when it parallels a natural river and shares part of the latter's discharges and drainage basin, and leverages its resources by building dams and locks to increase and lengthen its stretches of slack water levels while staying in its valley. A canal can cut across a drainage divide atop a ridge, generally requiring an external water source above the highest elevation. The best-known example of such a canal is the Panam ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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