by Anura Guruge
on June 29, 2022
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To me Serendipity involves three things: chance, luck and delight.
I am cool with ‘happy accident’ or ‘pleasant surprise’. Wikipedia, at one time, had this example, and I like it too: ‘to look for a needle in a haystack and get out of it with the farmer’s daughter‘.
I am eminently qualified to talk about Serendipity.
I was born in Serendipity.
I grew up in Serendipity.
The next book, after the one I am currently writing, will be called: ‘Tales from Serendipity‘.
‘Serendib‘ which morphed to ‘Serendip‘ is the Persian and Urdu (spoken in India and Pakistan) word for Ceylon, (now) Sri Lanka — the country in which I was born in 1953.
There was an ancient Persian folk tale about ‘The Three Princes of Serendip‘. (See image above). A hallmark of these three Persian Princes was their knack to stumble upon lucky discoveries.
This story had been translated and published in Italian, in Venice, in 1557, by a Michele Tramezzino, as Peregrinaggio di tre giovani figliuoli del re di Serendippo.
Horatio Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford (1717 – 1797), a man of significance in Britain, coined the term ‘Serendipity’ from the Persian tale to connote lucky, chance discoveries as made by the three Princess. All of this is well known among the right circles and copiously documented all over the Web. [Note that we have an ‘Orford’ in NH with a rather delightful diner.]
I personally think there is more to this story than just that.
In a country as old as Ceylon, with a written historic record going back to 3,000 BCE, you are bound to find various stories as to how the people came to be — in particular the Sinhalese — who make up 75% of the population. Yes, I am Sinhalese. ‘Sinhala’ basically translates ‘lion people’. I always think that that is cool, given that I love BIG cats. The dominant feature of the rather spectacular Ceylon flag is the Rampant Lion.
So far, so good. All makes sense. Right? Wrong.
Over the centuries Sri Lanka has been known as: Serendib, Serendipity, Taprobane, and Ceylon. However, irrespective of what it was called, Sri Lanka, the island, does NOT have lions (or tigers) and never have! We only have leopards. Yep. All true.
My adoptive mother’s family is ‘Jayasinghe‘ — again the ‘Singhe’, lion, victorious lion in this instance.
The story that we were told was of Prince Vijaya, exiled by his father, in three ships, with 700 followers — who, when supplies were getting rather low, luckily, stumbled upon the resplendent island. Serendipity!
I like Vijaya. He was a player. Many Sri Lankans take after him. That is why Vijaya was kicked out to sea by his father. Vijaya, as far as we can tell, came from far Northern India. Hence all this with lions. The Sinhalese, based on our language, are classed as being ‘Indo-ARYANs’. That part has always amused me. I always joke about having to explain to a German that we, brown all over, are indeed Aryans.
But, back to Serendipity and ‘The Three Princes of Serendip‘. Isn’t it serendipitous that the Vijaya story sounds so much like the Three Princes story. As to the three princes — he had 700 followers with him in the three ships. So, there must have have two other princes in that crow.
They sure lucked out when they found Serendipity by chance. It all fits together nicely.
