To appreciate beauty one has to move in silence and if you break this cardinal rule in Sigiriya, you might just become a victim of wasp attack! Over 250 tourists have been attacked by a colony of wasps at a fifth-century rock fortress in Sri Lanka causing a stampede. Military personnel helped evacuate the visitors and rush them to hospitals.
The Sigiriya rock, 160km north of Colombo, is a vastly popular World Heritage site. Sigiriya is an archeological site in Central Sri Lanka.
It contains the ruins of an ancient palace complex, built during the reign of King Kasyapa (477 - 495 AD).
The most significant feature of the Rock would have been the Lion staircase leading to the palace garden on the summit. All that remains now are the two colossal paws and a mass of brick masonry that surround the ancient limestone steps and the cuts and groves on the rock face give an idea of the size and shape of the lion figure.
The path by the lion’s feet, Image credit
Though traces of plaster and pigments occur all over this area, there are only two pockets of paintings surviving in the depressions of the rock face, about a 100 meters above the ground level. These paintings represent the earliest surviving examples of a Sri Lanka school of classical realism, already fully evolved by the 5th century, when these paintings had been made.
Image credit
Earlier the Sigiri style had been considered as belonging to the Central Indian school of Ajanta, but later considered as specifically different from the Ajanta paintings.
The ladies depicted in the paintings have been variously identified as Apsaras (heavenly maidens), as ladies of Kasyapa’s court and as Lightening Princess and Cloud Damsels.
The painting combines geometrical shapes and motifs with a free and complex rendering of characteristic volute or whorl motifs. It is nothing less than a masterpiece of expressionist painting
Afraid that this 1500-year-old frescoes known as the Sigiriya maidens might be harmed, authorities do not use chemicals or smoke on the insects.
Only the Hundreds of thousands of tourists who come to see the frescoes are told to maintain silence so as not to upset the wasps. So if you do go visiting here be sure to maintain the calm!
Source: News
