Miscellaneous Decorative Elements

As we have seen earlier the entrance doors and the columns are the major elements that had been given aesthetic treatment in earlier traditional houses. Certain other elements too can be seen in some of these houses, namely Lamp Niches, Roof Rafters, False Ceilings, Arches etc., which had received decorative treatments. During colonial period many more new elements had been introduced in houses and other buildings. These include Balconies, Railings and parapets for balconies, stairs etc.,  valace boards and barge boards and many others. This section deals with some of these elements briefly.

Lamp Niches

These are small niches provided in the thick walls of traditional houses and other buildings for the porpose of placing oil lamps during nights. Generally these niches can be seen on either side of the entrances. The level of aesthetic treatment given to these niches vary. These ranges from simple triangular niches to the ones with more elaborate decoration. It was pointed out in an earlier chapter that the decoration on plaster is minimal in early traditional buildings, but the lamp niche is one element that was treated decorations in plaster.

Lamp niches are found in one roomed rural houses too, but they are the simplest ones. The thickness of the wall too determine the level of decorative work that a nich could receive. Fig. 1 shows some niches with different levels of decorations.

Roof Rafters

Unlike the colonial period houses, where the usage of valance board and barge board had become common to cover the end of rafters, the traditional houses had exposed rafters and their ends generally decoratively cut. Rafters used in small buildings in Jaffna, even today,  are mostly of palmyra timber, and it does not take intricate and sharp decoration. Therefore  the decorations on this timber are very course and rough. The cross section of the rafter too cannot be exact rectangle, as the palmyra timber is split and cut with hand tools, and it is cut to form a rough elliptical cross section.

Larger members in the roof frame work such as valley rafters etc. were some times made out of hardwood timber and they too are decorated to match the decoration of the other rafters.

False Ceiling

It is not common to provide false ceiling in traditional buildings in Jaffna. However a limited number of houses and buildings would have had wooden false ceiling for only certain areas in them. One house, which stood intact in Vannarponnai area till around the end of 80s, had a heavy ceiling out of about 1 1/2 inches thick wooden planks on   decorated, exposed timber frame work. This was provided for the "Nadai koodam" area, whih is located immediately inside the main entrance door. This house had been one of the victim of the war and completely demolished without trace in early 90s.

Arches

Arch is not a common element in the traditional buildings of Jaffna. One can very rarely find one or two in a few old houses in specific locations. One of such locations is the entrance to shrine rooms, normally provided in "Naatsaar" houses. It seems that these arches are provided in these locations to give emphasis to a special entrance. These were not true arches and was in different shapes.