Available historical records suggest that Kandy was established by the King Wickramabahu III during the period of his reign from 1357-1374 A.D. From the 13^th or 14^th century, Kandy became a centre for both Mahayana and Theravada Buddhism, the religion's two major sects. The most important of its many Buddhist temples, Dalada Maligawa ("Temple of the Tooth"), was constructed under Kandyan kings during the periods 1687-1707 and 1747-82.

In 1592 the city became the capital of the Sinhalese kings, who preserved their independence during the period of European colonial rule. Kandy was the last Sinhalese kingdom to be subjugated by a colonial power. It survived the attacks of Ceylon's first two colonial rulers--the Portuguese and the Dutch--and finally succumbed to the third and last colonial ruler, the British, in 1818. While all the other Sinhalese kingdoms had been extinguished by the Portuguese in the early 1600s, Kandy survived with stubborn persistence for another two centuries.

The British considered the continued independence of Kandy a hindrance to the expansion of both their trade and their communications network in Ceylon. The first British attack against Kandy in 1803 was a failure. By 1815, however, the Kandyan chiefs became dissatisfied with their tyrannical king (of South Indian descent) and welcomed British intervention. In the ensuing agreement of 1815, the Kandyan Convention, the Kandyan king was deposed (he was sent to India into exile where he later died) and sovereignty was vested in the British crown, but the rights of the Kandyan chiefs were largely maintained. Soon, the chiefs became dissatisfied with this arrangement and openly rebelled in 1817 but were decisively subjugated by the British in 1818. Ceylon was thus brought, for the first time in many centuries, under unified rule. The history of Kandy and its townscape witnesses rapid and drastic change from the beginning of British rule particularly after the 1818 rebellion.