Rajagala

Rajagala, the Monarch's Rock, is a rugged, mysterious and thickly forested mountain in the sparsely populated and rarely visited part of Sri Lanka. The history of the place is unknown but monks must have inhabited it before the 1st century BCE. All over the northern summit of the mountain are extensive ruins still awaiting excavation and recovery from the thick jungle. Amongst the ruins are two most interesting antiquities.

The first of these is a large and beautifully made stone bowl. Such bowls were used for offering the first fruits of the harvest to the Buddha. Further away and in very thick jungle is a huge block of stone some 16 feet long with a Buddha image carved out of it. The unique thing about this image is that it is half finished. All the lines on the statue are straight and at right angles to each other and there are no details. It seems that apprentice sculptors did the work up to this stage and then the master was supposed to round it off, fill in the finer details and do the finishing touches, only in this case for some reason he never finished the job.

How To Get There
Rajagala is near Bakkiella which is on the road between Ampara and Maha Oya some 25 km north of Ampara. At the time of writing Ampara was still an unstable district.