Travel to Sri Lanka: Kandy and the Temple of the Tooth: Photo 1

Established as a capital only in 1511, Kandy had two dynasties and a total of 12 kings before the British took over in 1815.  Now, as then, the town was surrounded by hills (those to the east, in the distance here, are the Udawattakele): flat land has always been at a premium.  The Temple of the Tooth can be made out as the dark-roofed white building just to the left of the lake and nestled against what in Kandyan Times was a royal forest preserve.  The British made it into a park, which it remains. The name Kandy, by the way, is a Portuguese corruption of Kanda, or "Mountain," from Kanda Uda Pasrata, or "mountain kingdom." To the Sinhalese, even today, the town was Maha Nuwara, "Great City," or simply Nuwara. Many of the local buses, for example, are run by (and labelled in English as) the Maha Nuwara Bus Company.

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