Clippings From Sri Lanka & Sri Lankan Forteana

[Mama_Kitty]

I'm off to Sri Lanka in a couple of weeks and I'm sure I read somewhere about something Fortean of interest there, but I can't remember what! I'm out there for 3 1/2 weeks and it would be nice to make it into a bit of an expedition as well as just sightseeing and sunbathing.

Any ideas?

Ellie.

 

[Bilderberger]

Arthur C Clarke lives there.......errr........thats about all I can think of.

 

[stu neville]

Clarke did mention (in the book of "Arthur C Clarke's Mysterious World") that there was a legend among the Sri Lankan Vedda (the indigenous populace) of a tribe with whom they co-existed: this race were man-like, larger than Vedda, and they had frequent skirmishes with them. The Vedda eventually eradicated them by driving the tribe into a cave with a dead-end, and lighting fires at the cave mouth, thereby depleting the oxygen in the cave and suffocating them. Clarke speculated there may be a cavern deep in the Sri Lankan jungle containing bones that would revolutionise anthropology.

Or possibly not, if the scientific establishment got there first ...

I'm sure I remember something else, too...

 

[Anonymous]

Yes,Heuvelmans had a chapter on them in"On the Track of Unknown Animals".They were called Nittaewo,and by some accounts,they may have lived as late as circa 1800.

 

[ogopogo3]

What an odd choice for a vacation.

Isn't Sri Lanka still a hotbed of political unrest with bombings, kidnappings, disappearances, mass rapes and killings of civilians by security forces, recruitment of child soldiers and so on?

And you're going there to sunbathe?

 

[rynner2]

Some info on this page about the ancient land bridge linking SL to India.

No doubt Googling would turn up even more info on the science and legends about this.

 

[Anonymous]

Isn't there a sacred mountain on Sri Lanka that's supposed to have Buddha's footprint on the top of it? And the Bhodi tree: IIRC something about a cutting of it being transplanted to Sri Lanka and the 'original' one in India having been 're-grown' from the Sri Lankan one when things have happened to the 'original' (disease, vandalism etc.).

 

[Anonymous]

Isn't Sri Lanka still a hotbed of political unrest with bombings, kidnappings, disappearances, mass rapes and killings of civilians by security forces, recruitment of child soldiers and so on?

That's only in one small part of the island. If you worried about that sort of stuff in every country you planned to visit, you'd never leave the house. Let's face it, on reputation, people would never visit any of the major US cities on that basis!

 

[Mama_Kitty]

Having a ginger husband, I don't tend to do much sunbathing anyway, it was merely poetic licence on my part, explaining that I am trying to get something more out of this holiday than typical tourist stuff.

AV's right though, there aren't many places in the world without some form of regular violent activity. I doubt Going Places would be sending people there if there was a serious risk to their lives.

Thank you for the pointers, I'm still researching, however the Sri Lanka article I read a while ago is proving as elusive as the cryptids it described!

Ellie.

 

[Anonymous]

Check today's headlines, evidence of an ancient man made bridge between Sri Lanka and India.

LD

 

[evilsprout]

Karl Shuker tells of a notorious devil-bird of Sri Lanka, which is said to be unseen in the night, and make a sound like 'a boy in torture. whose screams are being stopped by being strangled'.

Shuker speculates it may be a type of nightjar, though other identities put forward include the Sri Lankan Wood Owl, Sri Lankan Eagle Owl, or one of Sri Lanka's many species of eagle or crake.

[Source: K.P.N. Shuker (1991), Extraordinary Animals Worldwide, Robert Hale, London, pp133-136]

 

[ramonmercado]

Reviving this Thread after 16 years with a possible Roman link to Sri Lanka.

Ancient grape seeds may link Sri Lankan trading port to Roman world
By Lizzie WadeDec. 12, 2018 , 7:00 AM

Visit Mantai, nestled into a bay in northwestern Sri Lanka, and today you’ll see nothing but a solitary Hindu temple overlooking the sea. But 1500 years ago, Mantai was a bustling port where merchants traded their era’s most valuable commodities. Now, a study of ancient plant remains reveals traders from all corners of the world—including the Roman Empire—may have visited or even lived there.

Mantai was a hub on the ancient trade networks that crisscrossed the Indian Ocean and connected the distant corners of Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Middle East. The port town flourished between 200 B.C.E. and 850 C.E. During that time, it would have been a nexus for the spice trade, which ferried Indonesian cloves and Indian peppercorns to Middle Eastern and Roman kitchens.

But for such a potentially important site in the ancient world, Mantai has been difficult for archaeologists to study. After excavations in the early 1980s, research was halted in 1984 by Sri Lanka’s civil war. “Mantai was firmly in the red zone,” says Robin Coningham, an archaeologist who studies South Asia at Durham University in the United Kingdom. Only after the fighting ended in 2009 could a team led by Sri Lanka’s Department of Archaeology return to continue excavations. ...

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/201...ly_2018-12-12&et_rid=394299689&et_cid=2544176

 

[AlchoPwn]

Reviving this Thread after 16 years with a possible Roman link to Sri Lanka.Ancient grape seeds may link Sri Lankan trading port to Roman world

Ahhh, exotic Taprobane https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annius_Plocamus. Now war ravaged and in debt to China, but still an amazing place. I hope they have better fortunes and better leaders in the future. We all need similar good fortune, as the world is not presently well led, but Sri Lanka is in a bad way.

 

[GNC]

Wasn't the Sri Lankan parliament involved in actual fistfights in the chamber of government recently?

 

[gattino]

I'm going to sri lanka in about 6 weeks..for a very short holiday. Having never been to the subcontinent, indeed barely having been to Asia at all, i too was flirting with locating something fortean that you don't get down your local Aldi. But ive no idea what. Maybe that impressive psychic who remains eternally elusive.

 

[Lord Lucan]

Here you go...

Haunted places in Sri Lanka.

I also recall reading a few years ago about a place in Columbo called Skyscraper City which was/is an abandoned apartment tower that was never lived in but rumoured to be inhabited by spirits. Google doesn't tell me much about it recently, but it could be worth a look or at least asking a local.