History of Sri Lanka, Volume II: From c. 1500 to c. 1800

The volume is organized into six broad parts. Part I studies Sri Lanka in the early sixteenth century, covering political conditions, economic and social structures, the rise and fall of Sītāvaka, the kingdom of Jaffna, Portuguese rule in Kōṭṭe, and the foundations and foreign relations of Kandy. Part II follows the expulsion of the Portuguese, the Kandyan kingdom from 1638 to 1739, Dutch consolidation in the maritime regions, the VOC in Sri Lanka, and the Kandyan kingdom under the Nāyakkars. Part III examines administrative systems under Kandyan and Dutch rule, social and economic life in the Kandyan kingdom, internal and external trade, and the social-economic impact of VOC rule. Part IV focuses on religion, literature, art, and architecture, including the relationship between religion and state in the Kandyan kingdom and cultural production across the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries. Part V analyzes the arrival of the English East India Company and the replacement of Dutch power in the island. Part VI provides scholarly apparatus including bibliography, list of kings, and index. Overall, the volume presents Sri Lanka between c.1500 and c.1800 as a highly dynamic historical field shaped by Sinhala kingdoms, Jaffna, Portuguese and Dutch expansion, Kandyan resilience, Buddhist institutions, trade systems, colonial administration, and cultural continuity.