The Chronicle
Two thousand years,
still walking.
The Perahera is not an annual festival. It is a procession that has, in one form or another, been walked continuously for more than sixteen hundred years. What follows is our attempt to record, in measured English prose, the ceremony's history, its structure, and its people.
- 01
Chapter I
The Sacred Tooth Relic
A fragment of bone, an emblem of kingship, and the still centre around which a ten-night procession turns. The history of the Dalada and its journey to Kandy.
- 02
Chapter II
The Five Peraheras
The ten nights of the Esala Perahera are not one procession but five, twice walked. A reading of the structure, and what distinguishes each night from the last.
- 03
Chapter III
The Cast of the Procession
Every Perahera is walked by roughly a thousand people and one hundred elephants. A guide to the figures in the procession, in the order in which they appear.
- 04
Chapter IV
Diya Kepeema — the Water Cutting
At dawn after the Maha Randoli, the Kapuralas wade into the Mahaweli and describe a circle in the water. This is how the Perahera ends.
- 05
Chapter V
Origins & Dates
How the Perahera became the Perahera — a history across five capitals, and the reason the ceremony still moves with the Esala moon.
Correspondence