The Maldives before Islam: its Buddhist past

Nobody knows exactly when Buddhism reached the Maldives. Most historians link it to early settlers and traders from Sri Lanka and southern India, and the Dhivehi language belongs to the same Indo-Aryan family as Sinhala. Estimates for the arrival of the religion range widely, from the last centuries BCE to the first centuries CE. The honest answer is that the evidence is thin and scholars still debate it.

What is clearer is that Buddhism lasted a long time. For roughly a thousand years, until the 12th century, kings ruled from Malé and Buddhist monasteries stood on many islands. The historian Hassan Ahmed Maniku recorded possible Buddhist sites on as many as 59 islands. Carvings and inscriptions suggest that the earlier Theravada tradition was later joined by Mahayana and Vajrayana (tantric) forms of Buddhism, which were also spreading across South Asia at the time.

The islands sat on busy sea routes. Ships crossing between Arabia, India, Sri Lanka and South-East Asia stopped here, and Maldivian cowrie shells were traded far across Asia and Africa. Our guide to cowrie shells tells that side of the story. Buddhism arrived along these same routes, and so, later, did Islam.

The traditional date: 1153

Maldivian tradition dates the conversion to 1153, when the king accepted Islam and took the title of sultan. A visiting Muslim scholar, often named as Abu al-Barakat, is credited with persuading him. Popular stories add dramatic detail, including a sea demon defeated by recitation of the Quran. These are much-loved legends rather than recorded history, and historians treat them as such.

Treat 1153 as a traditional date, not a precise one. Change across a scattered nation of islands would have taken time, and the written evidence suggests the process ran on for decades.

The copper plates

The most important written evidence comes from the loamaafaanu: royal grants inscribed on copper plates and given to the mosques built by the early sultans. Each set was bound on a ring and, by tradition, hung in the mosque so anyone could read it. Only a few sets survive, written in early forms of the old Maldivian script (later replaced by Thaana; see our guide to Dhivehi and the Thaana script).

The surviving plates from Laamu Atoll, dated by scholars to the 1190s, describe land once held by Buddhist institutions being given to new mosques. Scholars read them as showing that the conversion was ordered by the king and was not always gentle: they record monasteries being removed and stupas broken. The loamaafaanu were added to UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register for Asia and the Pacific in 2014.

Building on the past

Some early mosques may have been built on or near older Buddhist sites, and coral stone from ruins was sometimes reused. The craft of cutting and fitting coral stone carried on into the beautiful mosques of later centuries. You can see that tradition in our guide to the coral stone mosques of the Maldives.

Most Buddhist sites today are low mounds, scattered stones or foundations, often in the bush or near a village. Locally a ruined stupa is often called a havitta or ustubu. Several have been studied by archaeologists. For a wider list, see our guide to historical sites of the Maldives.

Kaashidhoo: Kuruhinna Tharaagandu

On Kaashidhoo, in Kaafu Atoll, a Norwegian and Maldivian team led by archaeologist Egil Mikkelsen excavated part of a large monastery between 1996 and 1998. They uncovered about 1,880 square metres and dozens of coral stone structures, including a sixteen-sided platform. Large numbers of cowrie shells were found, pointing to the trade that connected the islands to the wider world. It remains the most thoroughly studied Buddhist site in the country, and the excavated area is thought to be only part of the original complex.

Thoddoo

Thoddoo, in Alifu Alifu (North Ari) Atoll, has the remains of a stupa. A large stone head of the Buddha was found there in the 20th century; sources give the year differently. It became one of the best-known pieces of Maldivian Buddhist art.

Fuvahmulah: the Havitta

The one-island atoll of Fuvahmulah has the Havitta, a ruined stupa near the north-eastern end of the island. The British archaeologist H.C.P. Bell described it in the 1920s as a large mound. Later digging damaged it, and today it is much reduced.

Nilandhoo

Nilandhoo, in Faafu Atoll, has the Foamathi site, investigated in the 1980s. The Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl wrote a popular book on the mounds of Nilandhoo and Fuvahmulah. His wider theories about ancient sun-worshippers are not accepted by most historians, but his work brought attention to sites that had been little studied.

Elsewhere

Bell, who surveyed the islands in the early 20th century, recorded stupa remains on several southern islands and described their style as close to that of Anuradhapura in Sri Lanka. Many more mounds exist, mostly unexcavated. The Maldives has around 400 recorded heritage sites, and Buddhist remains are only a part of them.

The pre-Islamic past survives in pieces:

• Coral stone carvings and sculpture. The National Museum in Malé holds coral stone pieces from the pre-Islamic period, along with the copper plates.
• Mounds and foundations. Dozens of sites across the atolls, most of them unexcavated.
• Words and script. Dhivehi is related to Sinhala, and the old Maldivian scripts grew out of the same South Asian family of writing as those of Sri Lanka and India.
• Trade finds. Cowrie shells, pottery and stoneware from monastery sites show how connected the islands were.

In February 2012, during a period of political crisis, a group of men broke into the National Museum and smashed much of its collection of pre-Islamic sculpture, made of brittle coral and limestone. Museum staff said most pieces could not be restored. It was a heavy loss for the country’s history, and many Maldivians mourned it.

Since then, interest in the period has grown again. The full Kaashidhoo excavation report was republished in 2025, and Maldivian and international researchers continue to study manuscripts, inscriptions and sites.

Today the Maldives is a fully Muslim nation, and Islam shapes daily life on every inhabited island. Our guide to religion in the Maldives explains what this means for visitors. Ancient sites are part of the national heritage, not religious shrines, and they deserve the same care you would give any archaeological site.

If you want to see a site:

• Ask the island council first. Many sites are on local islands with no signs or staff. The council can tell you whether you can visit and who looks after it.
• Do not climb on mounds or ruins. Coral stone is fragile and crumbles easily.
• Take nothing away. Removing artefacts, stone or coral can be a crime.
• Dress modestly. Cover shoulders and knees on local islands; see what to wear in the Maldives.
• Be thoughtful in conversation. People are often happy to talk about history, but pre-Islamic religion can be a sensitive subject. Listen more than you argue.
• Ask before photographing people, and avoid visiting during Friday midday prayer, when many places close.

You don’t need to visit a ruin to sense how old island life is. On Dhiffushi, like many local islands, the rhythm of fishing, prayer and community runs back many generations. Kaashidhoo, home of the best-known monastery site, lies in the same Kaafu Atoll. For the full timeline from early settlement to the republic, read our history of the Maldives.