At the heart of the city is Kandy Lake, built by Sri Wickrama Rajasinha, the last independent Sinhala King of Sri Lanka. The Temple of the Tooth, or the Dalada Maligawa, where Sri Lanka's most sacred relic, the tooth of Buddha is kept, is on the shores of this lake.
The Tooth relic was brought to Sri Lanka in the 4th century A.D. and to Kandy in 1590 during the reign of King Wimala Dhramasuriya who enshrined it in a small temple. Three generations later King Narendra Sinha built a two story shrine on the site of the present Temple. This old shrine survives today as the "Inner Temple" of the "Dalada maligawa". Many improvements were made to the shrine by later kings. The now famous "Pattirippuwa", (octagon) was added by King Sri Wickrama Rajasinghe, as a place to address his subjects.

For more information about Kandy please check out these links:
||- Kandy -||- City Guides -||