Art & Craft · Oral Traditions
Poetry, Music & Storytelling
Long before print, Sri Lanka’s culture travelled in verse — sung in paddy fields, chanted at harvest, whispered in folk tales beside the hearth.
5 min read
An educational feature from the Art & Craft collection.
01
Janakavi — the people’s poetry
Janakavi (folk poetry) is anonymous verse composed and passed on orally by ordinary people. It includes work songs such as goyam kavi sung during the paddy harvest, pal kavi sung by farmers keeping night watch over crops, and nelum kavi sung while threshing.
02
Classical verse
Alongside folk verse grew a literary tradition, including the sandesha kavya — message poems in which a bird carries a message across the island, describing towns and landscapes along the way.
03
Instruments
Drums lie at the heart of traditional music: the geta bera, yak bera, davula and thammattama. They are joined by wind instruments such as the horanewa, and the udekki, a small hourglass drum.
04
Stories by the hearth
Folk tales of the witty Andare and the foolish Mahadenamutta and his pupils remain well known. Through humour they teach about wisdom, foolishness and life in the village.
Did you know
Interesting facts
01
Janakavi is usually anonymous, belonging to communities rather than authors.
02
Sandesha poems are an important source on medieval Sri Lankan places.
03
Andare is said to have been a jester at a royal court.
References & further reading
Content is summarised from the sources above for educational purposes. LANKA. is an independent publication.
