The spire itself was "painted with red stick-lac," probably the same preparation of vermilion as is used at the present day on the lacquered ware of Burmah, Siam, and China.[1] Gaudy colours appear at all times to have been popular; yellow, from its religious associations, pre-eminently so[2]; and red lead was applied to the exterior of dagobas.[3] Bujas Raja, in the 4th century, painted the walls and roof of the Brazen Palace blue[4], and built a sacred edifice at Anarajapoora, which from the variety and brilliancy of the colours with which he ornamented the exterior, was known as the Monara Paw Periwena, or Temple of the Peacock.[5]
1: A species of lacquer painting is practised with great success at the present day in the Kandyan provinces, and especially at Matelle, the colours being mixed with a resinous exudation collected from a shrub called by the Singhalese Wæl-koep-petya (Croton lacciferum). The coloured varnish thus prepared is formed into films and threads chiefly by aid of the thumb-nail of the left hand, which is kept long and uncut for the purpose. It is then applied by heat and polished. It is chiefly employed in ornamenting the covers of books, walking-sticks, the shafts of spears, and the handles of fans for the priesthood. The Burmese artists who make the japanned ware of Ava, use the hand in laying on the lacquer—which there, too, as well as in China, is the produce of a tree, the Melanorhoea glabra of Wallich.
2: Rajaratnacari, p. 184.
3: Mahawanso, ch. xxxiv. p. 212.
4: Rajavali, p. 291. The blue used for this purpose was probably a preparation of indigo; the red, vermilion; the yellow, orpiment; and green was obtained by combining the first and last.
5: Rajavali, p. 73.