Karaiyar

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Karaiyar ( Tamil கரையார் Karaiyār and Tamil குருகுலம் Kurukulam ) is the Tamil professional caste of landowning fishermen in the northern and eastern coastal areas of Sri Lanka and also on the Coromandel Coast of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu is and can be found in the Tamil diaspora around the world. Traditionally it was a seafaring and warrior caste whose members are now employed in the fishing industry.

It was also historically referred to as Kurukulam and Karaiyalar . The medieval leaders of these clans were known as Pattankattiyar .

The Sinhala- speaking Karaiyar are known as the Karava , who were of Tamil origin, came under the Sinhalese kingdom and assimilated into Sinhala society.

etymology

The word karaiyar is derived from karai , which means "coast" in Tamil. Karaiyar therefore means "coastal people".

Your title Kurukulam is derived from the words kuru and kulam (Tamil for "clan"). The word Kuru refers to the Kuru Kingdom , the place of its legendary origin. So the word is literally translated as "Kuru clan". Her sovereign title Pattankattiyar means "the crowned one" in Tamil.

history

The Purananuru from the time of the Sangam literature is one of the earliest references to this clan, mentioned there as Karaiyavar . Claudius Ptolemy from the 2nd century AD referred to them as Kareoi , who had their headquarters in Korkai , an important ancient trading port of the Kingdom of Pandyan .

The Makara flag of the Karaiyars

Several Tamil literary works such as Kailaya Malai , Pararajasekaran Ula , Vaiya Padal and Yalpana Vaipava Malai mention their importance in the Kingdom of Jaffna . The Karaiyars were responsible for the western part of the kingdom, especially the ports. The Makara , the mount of their patron god Varuna , served as an emblem and was seen on their flags.

According to the Mukkara Hatana manuscript, a battalion of 7,740 Karaiyar soldiers defeated the Mukkuvars and the Sonakar in a three-month siege. Since the leader of the battalion had died in the war, his son, Sapumal Kumaraya , was adopted by the king of the Kotte Kingdom and later crowned king.

Under the reign of Cankili II, King of Jaffna, the king urged the Karaiyars and soldiers from the Kingdom of Thanjavur-Nayak to reclaim his kingdom, occupied by the Portuguese colonial masters. The Karaiyar troops, headed by Karaiyar chief Migapulle Arachchi , agreed with the Thanjavur Nayak troops and fought against the Portuguese in the conquest of the Kingdom of Jaffna. After the defeat, larger parts of the Karaiyar were converted to Catholic Christianity by the Portuguese.

Karaiyars formed the leadership of the Tamil Tigers , a group that fought in the Sri Lankan civil war to establish a sovereign Tamil state that wanted to secede from the Sinhalese majority in Sri Lanka. LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran and his Karaiyar supporters found the caste restrictions imposed by Vellalar just as oppressive as the alleged Sinhala discrimination against Tamils.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Selva J. Raj: South Asian Christian Diaspora: Invisible Diaspora in Europe and North America ( en ). Routledge, April 1, 2016, ISBN 9781317052296 .
  2. ^ Sonia N. Das: Linguistic Rivalries: Tamil Migrants and Anglo-Franco Conflicts ( en ). Oxford University Press, 2016, ISBN 9780190461782 , p. 236.
  3. ^ Modern Ceylon Studies . University of Ceylon, 1975, p. 48 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  4. ^ University of Cambridge (ed.): The Ceylon Historical Journal . Tisara Prakasakayo, 1982, p. 17 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  5. ↑ Patrick Peebles: Historical Dictionary of Sri Lanka . Rowman & Littlefield, 2015, ISBN 978-1-4422-5585-2 , pp. 65 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  6. ^ Robert Caldwell : History of Tinnevelly . Asian Educational Services, 2004, ISBN 978-81-206-0161-1 , pp. 19 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  7. ↑ Kenneth David: The New Wind: Changing Identities in South Asia . Walter de Gruyter, 1977, ISBN 978-3-11-080775-2 , p. 186 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  8. ↑ பட்டங்கட்டி | அகராதி | Tamil Dictionary. University of Madras Lexicon, accessed November 24, 2017 .
  9. ^ SR Rao: Marine Archeology of Indian Ocean Countries: Proceedings of the First Indian Conference on Marine Archeology of Indian Ocean Countries, Oct. 1987 . National Institute of Oceanography, 1988, ISBN 978-81-900074-0-5 , pp. 118 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  10. ^ Robert Caldwell : History of Tinnevelly . Asian Educational Services, 2004, ISBN 978-81-206-0161-1 , pp. 13 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  11. ^ MD Raghavan: India in Ceylonese History: Society, and Culture . Asia Publishing House, 1964, pp. 147 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  12. ^ Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Sri Lanka . Royal Asiatic Society of Sri Lanka, 1993, p. 137 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  13. ^ Dennis B. McGilvray: Crucible of Conflict: Tamil and Muslim Society on the East Coast of Sri Lanka . Duke University Press, 2008, ISBN 0822341611 , p. 61.
  14. ↑ MD Raghavan: The Karava of Ceylon: Society and Culture . University of Pennsylvania, 1961, pp. 14-16 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  15. ↑ V. Vriddhagirisan: Nayak of Tanjore . Asian Educational Services, 1995, ISBN 978-81-206-0996-9 , pp. 91 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  16. ↑ Dagmar Hellmann-Rajanayagam: From Jaffna to Kilinocchi: Change in the political consciousness of the Tamils ​​in Sri Lanka . Ergon, 2007, ISBN 978-3-89913-544-2 , pp. 104 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  17. ^ Eva Gerharz: The Politics of Reconstruction and Development in Sri Lanka: Transnational Commitments to Social Change . Routledge, 2014, ISBN 978-1-317-69280-5 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).
  18. ↑ A. Jeyaratnam Wilson: Sri Lankan Tamil Nationalism: Its Origins and Development in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries . UBC Press, 2000, ISBN 978-0-7748-0759-3 , pp. 24 ( google.no [accessed November 24, 2017]).