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Nira Wickramasinghe, professor in history and international relations, spoke to us about what this long-established pattern means for the region today:
荷蘭萊頓大學從事歷史與國際關系研究的尼拉維克拉馬辛格教授為我們闡釋了歷史上這種持久的關系模式對當今該地區形勢的影響：
"I think in many ways you can speak of a south Indian/Sri Lankan region with many points in common, culturally and politically as well. There has also been a two-way flow of influences in art, religion, technology. Of course it has not always been a peaceful relationship; there have also been invasions and wars between southern states and chiefdoms in Sri Lanka.
印度南部與斯里蘭卡地區在文化、政治等諸多方面都相通,而藝術、宗教與技術上的影響也一直是雙向的。當然，它們的關系并非一直是和平的，歷史上印度南方各邦與斯里蘭卡諸酋邦之間的侵略和戰爭也時有發生。
"It's really trade that brought people from India to Sri Lanka. You have certain communities which are really fairly recent migrants from south India, so they would have come in the ninth to thirteenth centuries. In fact, they merged their south Indian identity with a more Sri Lankan identity, and what is curious now is that many of these are the most ardent Sinhala nationalists. I mean if you look at their roots, their roots are very much in south India."
是貿易吸引人從印度去往斯里蘭卡。斯里蘭卡有許多社區是在9世紀至13世紀之間由印度南方的新移民所建。他們慢慢地讓自己的南印度身份與斯里蘭卡身份相融合，并且更認同后者。有意思的是，這些人的后裔如今反而成了最激進的僧伽羅民族主義者。
And so it goes on, 1,200 years later, the complex working-out of the relationships that we see embodied in Tara, between Sinhalese and Tamil, between Sri Lanka and south India, between Buddhists and Hindus. Relationships that in Sri Lanka have tragically included the recent long and bloody civil war.
這種錯綜復雜的關系早在度母形象上便有所呈現，僧伽羅人與泰米爾人、 斯里蘭卡與印度南部、佛教徒與印度教徒，彼此間的影響在1200年后的今天依然延續。悲劇的是，在斯里蘭卡，這一關系也導致了現代歷時甚久的血腥內戰。
But Tara may in fact have survived thanks to earlier warfare. Marks on the surface of the sculpture suggest that she was buried at some point, perhaps to avoid her being looted by invaders and then melted down.
但這尊度母雕像的幸存也多虧了戰爭。佛像表面的痕跡說明它曾被埋在地下，也許就是為了躲過人侵者的洗劫、逃脫被重鑄的下場。
