The Kingdom of Kandy has survived the attacks of Ceylon's colonial Portuguese rulers, partly by allying with the Dutch.

While all the other Sinhalese kingdoms had been extinguished by the Portuguese in the early 1600s, Kandy survives with stubborn persistence.

Rajavaliya, a historical chronicle of Sri Lanka covering the history of the island from its legendary beginnings up to the accession of Kandyan King Vimaladharmasurya II in 1687, is the only continuous history of the island written in the Sinhalese language prior to the British period.

Unlike many other Sri Lankan historical chronicles, the Rajavaliya deals mainly with political rather than religious (Buddhist) events.

Its style is a popular rather than a learned one, and historians believe it to have been the work of more than one hand.

It is considered to be especially useful for the period after 1359.