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Sri Lankan Vellalar

Sri Lankan Vellalar (Tamil: இலங்கை வெள்ளாளர், lit. 'Ilaṅkai veḷḷāḷar') is a caste in Sri Lanka, predominantly found in the Jaffna peninsula and adjacent Vanni region, who comprise about half of the Sri Lankan Tamil population. They were traditionally involved in agriculture, but also included merchants, landowners and temple patrons.[2][3] They also form part of the Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora.[4]

Sri Lankan Vellalar
ReligionsHinduism, Christianity
LanguagesTamil
SubdivisionsHistorically; currently non-existent :
  • Periya Vellalar
  • Chinna Vellalar
[1]
Related groupsSri Lankan Tamils, Sinhaleses, Tamils, Vellalar

They are reputed as a ritually and numerically dominant caste in the Northern Sri Lankan society, who have contributed among the political elites of the Sri Lankan Tamils.[5] Many of the Tamil Mudaliyars, a high colonial rank, were drawn from the Vellalar caste.[6] In Eastern Sri Lanka, the Vellalars as other prominent castes there, are further divided into kudis or matrilineal clans.[7]

Etymology

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The word Vellalar is derived from their art of irrigation and cultivation.[8] The word comes from the Tamil words veḷḷam ("flood", "water" or "abundance") and āṇmai ("lordship" or "management"); thus the word literally means "those who manage water" or "lords of the floods".[9][10] Dutch archives registered the Vellalar and the Govigama under the term Bellalas.[11]

History

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See also: Vellalar

Medieval era

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The Kailayamalai, an account on Kalinga Magha, the founder of Jaffna Kingdom, narrates the migration of Vellalar Nattar chiefs from the Coromandel Coast of South India.[12] Vellalar chiefs from the Malavar and Gangeyar clans were appointed to administrative office by the first Jaffna king Cinkaiariyan (ca. 1280 AD).[13] The Vellalars who were village headmen and landlords bore the title Udaiyar.[14][15]

Colonial era

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Arumuka Navalar, a 19th-century Shaivite scholar and reputed patron of Shaiva Siddhanta.

In the time of Portuguese Ceylon, the Vellalars were described as husbandmen, who were involved in tillage and cattle cultivation.[16] According to S. Arasaratnam, Vellalar dominance was strengthened by Dutch colonizers after the fall of the Portuguese.[17] The Portuguese had appointed the affluent Karaiyars and Madapallis to administrative offices. Karaiyars and Madapallis revolted against the new Dutch rule in September 1658, consequently leading to the Dutch favoring the Vellalars to administrative positions.[13] The Dutch interpreted the local laws, later codified as Thesavalamai, as allowing landlords to own slaves. Thus the Vellalar chiefs and other landlord castes had the Koviars and also the Panchamar ("the fives") consisting of the Nalavars, Pallars, Paraiyars, Vannars, and Ambattars working under them as domestic servants altogether known as Kudimakkal.[18][19] These castes were originally bonded to the service of the state, however, they were often illegally turned to be bonded to individual Vellalars as their dominance started growing. The growing power of the Vellalars was counterbalanced by removing the Madapallis from earlier suspicion and equally appoint them to the administrative office by the Dutch in the 1690s.[13]

The Thesavalamai mentions the Koviars as descendant of the Vellalars, and intermarriage between them was not uncommon.[20] According to historians, the Vellalar population increased between the 17th and 19th-century due to other castes and communities assimilating in Vellalar society after the fall of Jaffna Kingdom, which included castes such as the Agampadiyar (palace servants), Chettiar (merchants), Maravar (soldiers), Thanakkarar (temple managers), Madapallis (palace cooks and stewards), Malayalis, and Paradesis (foreigners, skilled workers).[21][22][23][24] There used to be a concept of Periya Vellalan and Chinna Vellalan, where the Chinna Vellalan was a subdivision compromising the castes who had assimilated in the Vellalar identity.[25][26]

During colonial rule, some Vellalars converted to Christianity.[27] These conversions allowed them to hold land, properties and government offices.[6] The Dutch minister Philippus Baldaeus of the 17th century, described the Christian Vellalars, Karaiyars and Madapallis as the most influential classes of Christians on the peninsula.[28] Under Dutch rule in the 18th century, some Vellalars earned fortunes through tobacco cultivation.[6] The Vellalars started to become a dominant caste in the Jaffna Peninsula and also the most numerous in the Dutch census.[29]

Due to the effort of the religious reformer, Arumuka Navalar, the conversion to Christianity of many Hindu Vellalars was prevented.[30] They became under his patronage, strict followers of Shaiva Siddhanta, and achieved dominance through ritual design.[12][31] Well-to-do Vellalars from Jaffna and Colombo formed one of the political Sri Lankan Tamil elites, one of such being the Ponnambalam-Coomaraswamy family.[5][2]

Modern era

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Vellalar political and ritual dominance was severely restricted due to the post-1983 Sri Lankan civil war domination of Tamil politics by the main rebel group Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) whose top leaders, such as Velupillai Prabhakaran, were mostly from the Karaiyar caste.[21][32] The LTTE did not have caste distinctions and one of their ideologies were anti-casteism, seeking a united Tamil identity through recruiting of other castes and achieving a mixed-caste leadership.[33][34] Following the old order, where the Vellalars formed partners with the Karaiyars, the LTTE gained support and recruitment from the Vellalars who also contributed as leaders and cadres.[35][36]

The People's Liberation Organisation of Tamil Eelam (PLOTE), Tamil Eelam Liberation Organization (TELO) and Eelam Revolutionary Organisation of Students (EROS) were Vellalar dominated organizations, with several Vellalar cadres of these organization later joining the LTTE.[12][37][38]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Perinbanayagam, R. S. (1982). The karmic theater: self, society, and astrology in Jaffna. University of Massachusetts Press. p. 26. ISBN 9780870233746.
  2. ^ a b Bush, Kenneth (9 December 2003). The Intra-Group Dimensions of Ethnic Conflict in Sri Lanka: Learning to Read Between the Lines. Springer. p. 52. ISBN 9780230597822.
  3. ^ Derges, Jane (20 May 2013). Ritual and Recovery in Post-Conflict Sri Lanka. Routledge. ISBN 978-1136214882.
  4. ^ Pfaffenberger, Bryan (1985). "Vellalar domination". Man. 20 (1): 158. JSTOR 2802228.
  5. ^ a b Welhengama, Gnanapala; Pillay, Nirmala (5 March 2014). The Rise of Tamil Separatism in Sri Lanka: From Communalism to Secession. Routledge. p. 168. ISBN 9781135119713.
  6. ^ a b c Manogaran, Chelvadurai; Pfaffenberger, Bryan (1994). The Sri Lankan Tamils: ethnicity and identity. Westview Press. pp. 35, 43, 147, 149. ISBN 9780813388458.
  7. ^ Thurnheer, Katharina (30 June 2014). Life Beyond Survival: Social Forms of Coping After the Tsunami in War-affected Eastern Sri Lanka. Transcript Verlag. pp. 142–143. ISBN 9783839426012. McGilvray (19822, 1982b, 1989; 2008, 103) elaborated on a specific feature in marriage practices of eastern Sri Lanka by demonstrating the relevance of matrilineal, exogamous sub-caste categories for marriage relationships: marriages are arranged between members of matriclans or descent units called kudis (kudi). [...] The kudi system and the entailed marriage practice more characteristically describe the paddy-field cultivating Vellalar or Mukkuvar and other castes rather than the Karaiyar.
  8. ^ Rangaswamy, M. A. Dorai; Araṅkacāmi, Mor̲appākkam Appācāmi Turai (1968). The surnames of the Caṅkam age: literary & tribal. University of Madras. p. 152.
  9. ^ Kent, Eliza F. (1 April 2004). Converting Women: Gender and Protestant Christianity in Colonial South India. Oxford University Press. p. 62. ISBN 9780198036951.
  10. ^ Journal of the Ceylon branch of the Royal Asiatic Society By Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland. Ceylon Branch, Colombo: "'Vellalar' is also said to be a contract form of 'Vella-Alar', meaning 'the lords of the Vellam', flood..."[1]
  11. ^ Dewasiri, Nirmal Ranjith (12 December 2007). The Adaptable Peasant: Agrarian Society in Western Sri Lanka under Dutch Rule, 1740-1800. BRILL. p. 189. ISBN 9789047432821.
  12. ^ a b c Holt, John (13 April 2011). The Sri Lanka Reader: History, Culture, Politics. Duke University Press. pp. 84, 85, 518. ISBN 978-0822349822.
  13. ^ a b c Arasaratnam, S. (1 July 1981). "Social History of a Dominant Caste Society: The Vellalar of North Ceylon (Sri Lanka) in the 18th Century". The Indian Economic & Social History Review. 18 (3–4): 377–391. doi:10.1177/001946468101800306. ISSN 0019-4646. S2CID 143603755.
  14. ^ Gunasingam, M. Sri Lankan Tamil Nationalism, p. 62
  15. ^ K, Arunthavarajah (March 2014). "The Administration of Jaffna Kingdom – A Historical View" (PDF). International Journal of Business and Administration Research Review. 2 (3). University of Jaffna: 32.
  16. ^ Fernando, A. Denis N. (1987). "PENINSULAR JAFFNA FROM ANCIENT TO MEDIEVAL TIMES: Its Significant Historical and Settlement Aspects". Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Sri Lanka. 32: 84. JSTOR 23731055.
  17. ^ Gerharz, Eva (3 April 2014). The Politics of Reconstruction and Development in Sri Lanka: Transnational Commitments to Social Change. Routledge. ISBN 9781317692799.
  18. ^ A., Geetha, K. (1 July 2010). "In Need of Translation: An Analysis of Sri Lankan Tamil Dalit Literature". ARIEL. 41 (3–4). ISSN 0004-1327.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  19. ^ Raghavan, M. D. (1971). Tamil culture in Ceylon: a general introduction. Kalai Nilayam. p. 167.
  20. ^ Tambiah, Henry Wijayakone (1954). The laws and customs of the Tamils of Ceylon. Tamil Cultural Society of Ceylon. p. 59.
  21. ^ a b Wilson, A. Jeyaratnam (2000). Sri Lankan Tamil Nationalism: Its Origins and Development in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries. University of British Columbia Press. pp. 17, 18, 20. ISBN 9781850655190.
  22. ^ Ramasamy, Rajakrishnan (1988). Sojourners to citizens: Sri Lankan Tamils in Malaysia, 1885-1965. R. Rajakrishnan. ISBN 9789839953503.
  23. ^ The Journal of Asian Studies, Volume 49. Cambridge University Press. 1990. p. 81.
  24. ^ Wickramasinghe, Nira (2015). Sri Lanka in the Modern Age: A History. Oxford University Press. p. 274. ISBN 9780190225797.
  25. ^ David, Kenneth (1 January 1977). The New Wind: Changing Identities in South Asia. Walter de Gruyter. pp. 189, 190, 204. ISBN 9783110807752.
  26. ^ Civattampi, Kārttikēcu (1995). Sri Lankan Tamil society and politics. New Century Book House. p. 20. ISBN 9788123403953.
  27. ^ Lee, Jonathan H. X.; Nadeau, Kathleen M. (21 December 2010). Encyclopedia of Asian American Folklore and Folklife [3 volumes]. ABC-CLIO. p. 1044. ISBN 9780313350672.
  28. ^ Seeland, Klaus (1993). "Volume 24". International Quarterly for Asian Studies. Weltform Verlag.: 266.
  29. ^ Indian Antiquary, A Journal of Oriental Research. Popular Prakashan. 1873. p. 229.
  30. ^ Sugirtharajah, R. S. (16 June 2005). The Bible and Empire: Postcolonial Explorations. Cambridge University Press. p. 165. ISBN 9780521824934.
  31. ^ Bergunder, Michael; Frese, Heiko (2011). Ritual, Caste, and Religion in Colonial South India. Primus Books. ISBN 9789380607214.
  32. ^ Cheran, R. (11 April 2009). Pathways of Dissent: Tamil Nationalism in Sri Lanka. SAGE Publications India. p. 50. ISBN 9788132104322.
  33. ^ Thurnheer, Katharina (2014). Life Beyond Survival: Social Forms of Coping After the Tsunami in War-affected Eastern Sri Lanka. transcript Verlag. p. 32. ISBN 9783839426012.
  34. ^ Wilson, A. Jeyaratnam (1994). S.J.V. Chelvanayakam and the Crisis of Sri Lankan Tamil Nationalism, 1947-1977: A Political Biography. Hurst. p. 140. ISBN 9781850651307.
  35. ^ Wilson, A. Jeyaratnam (2000). Sri Lankan Tamil Nationalism: Its Origins and Development in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries. UBC Press. pp. 18–24. ISBN 9780774807593.
  36. ^ Sociological Bulletin. University of Bombay: Indian Sociological Society. 1989. p. 133.
  37. ^ Krishna, Sankaran (1999). Postcolonial Insecurities: India, Sri Lanka, and the Question of Nationhood. University of Minnesota Press. p. 109. ISBN 9781452903873.
  38. ^ Wilson, A. Jeyaratnam (2000). Sri Lankan Tamil Nationalism: Its Origins and Development in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries. Hurst. p. 126. ISBN 9781850655190.
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