Very Good Morning Travelers,
Welcome back my today's travel blog. As usual today I'm going to share most impressive travel destination with you. This is a world famous one but current generation haven't more knowledge about it. So nowadays this place is unpopular area. The Girihandu dagoba is very oldest and historical temple located Trincomalee district in Sri Lanka.
Whole around the area covered by the forest and paddy fields. The village called Thiriyaya is about one mile away from the twenty seventh between twenty eighth mile poles on the Trincomalee - Pulmudai road. This archaeological site is found west of this village.
We have to climbed upstairs for find historical hirihandu temple. Situated a top a hill, this Dagoba is known as the Girihandu Seya (dagoba) of Thiriyaya. It is considered that the Dagaba was built by the Buddha's hair relics. There are many temples and monasteries of different eras.
Written in Sanskrit on a rock on the south side of the Vatadage, this 20-foot-long and 5-foot-wide girillipi gives a detailed description of the temple. This inscription is written in the letters Pallava Grantha. But I don't know enough about archeology to provide all the details. Everything is mentioned in history books. This letter can't erase and permanently carved on the stone.
This is a entrance door built from totally stones. Much stronger and being ruined with pass time.
>Inscriptions indicate that this shrine was a monastery from the 3rd century BC to the 10th century BC. It is said that this place was a Buddhist center until the 18th century AD. The site was declared an archaeological site in 1930. Excavations were started by the Department of Archaeology in 1951.
You can see four rows of stairs from the four sides of the entrance to the courtyard of the Dagoba, known as the Vatadage of Tiriyya. At the top of each flight of stairs is a door made of stone. At the foot of the gates, there are sandakada pahana, dragon corvaraks and cobra. There is no other beauty of the moonstone other than the lotus petals. Very simple. There are six statues around the Vatadage. The largest of these statues is a brick statue of Buddha.
Inside the vatadage no any roof covered because it's oldest one. It's important to show oldest looks to others naturally. So authority doesn't go to change these patterns. There was flowers on the stage infront of Buddha.
On the east side are the ruins of a rock bridge near the preserved ponds and staircases. This indicates that a highway near the Thiriyaya sacred area was in ancient times. Several rock caves are located on the eastern side of the hill. Two of these are inscriptions with Brahmi characters. Anyone can't access to walk thought it. That's enough to write. So thanks for reading. See you later.