The Sri Mahabodhi Tree(Ficus religiosa)

» THE SRI MAHABODHI TREE (Ficus religiosa)


It is hard to believe - but there is no shadow of doubt at all - that this small tree with limbs so slender that they must be supported on iron crutches, is the oldest historically authenticated tree in the world (2,250 years). A branch of the very Bodhi beneath which - at Buddha Gaya in North India - the prince siddharta himself found Enlightenment. It was brought to Sri Lanka in the 3rd Century B.C. by the Princess/religious Sanghamitta, a sister of the saint Mahinda.

It has never since been without its hereditary attendants and the care, to the very end, of the country's kings. As lately as the reign of the last of them (Sri Wikrama Rajasingha) whom the British captured and deported, a wall was built by royal command to repair the platform on which it grows. In 1966 it was enclosed in a golden railing.