The Kingdom of Ceylon

While you may not have heard of the Island or Nation of Sri Lanka, you most probably have heard of Ceylon Tea.  Such is the history of colonialism.  Sri Lanka is an island nation to the South and East of the tip of the Indian Subcontinent.  There are lots of concise and well written histories of Sri Lanka.  This isn't one of them.

The historical pattern here is very similar to those of the other spice trading kingdoms around Southeast Asia.  The island of Sri Lanka is populated, in the loosest terms, by the Tamils in the North and the Sinhala in the South.  Arabic traders were the first influx of outside traders, settling here in the 7th and 8th centuries and bringing their new religion of Islam with them.  Hindu, Buddhist and Islamic teachings all had their place on the island.  Various small kingdoms fought each other for this reason or that, made alliances with others, and then borke those alliances.  Eventually the powers of the outside world showed up.

The first European colonists and traders were the Portuguese.  As in India and other parts of Africa and Southeast Asia, it was the Portuguese who ventured out in the late 15th Century in search of treasure and trade.  The Portugeuse made alliances with some local rulers against others, shifted trading partners, or conquered by force, whichever was easier.  By the end of the 16th century, the Portuguese were be swept aside by the new kid on the European power block, the Dutch.  

In the thrall of the huge profits to be made from the lure of spice, the Dutch were ruthless traders and colonists.  The Galle Fort is a Dutch construction, built on the humbler Portuguese ramparts.  Industrious and organized, the Dutch set up colonial outpost throughout the sweep of India, Ceylon, and down through the spice regions of Malaysia, Indonesia, Java, and  Sumatra.  Whether it was Mace, cinnamon, cardamom, black peppercorns, or nutmeg, a single load returned successfully to Rotterdam or Amsterdam could yield enough to make a captain rich for the rest of his life and still reward the Indies Company with great profits.  Sailors debarking the ships were thouroughly searched for spice hidden in the seams of their clothing or bottoms of their seabags, such was the value of even a few ounces of the stuff.

The next wave of colonial power came from Britan.  As British naval might began to rule the seas, so to did England become the world's first super-power.  While it is true that the Dutch and English kept up a steady trade war, complete with piracy, it was the English who began to control the territory.  Pushing other colonial powers out, the English set their sights on the Subcontinent of India.  As Napoleon seized the Netherlands, the Dutch in Ceylon ceded the island to the English for "protection".  Thus began the plantation phase of Sri Lankan history.  

The English worked coffee and then tea plantations on the island, as well as spice plantations, particularly cinnamon.  To man the plantations, the English imported Tamil workers from India, many of whom died in droves of illness and hardships experience on the plantations.  These Tamil workers were not the original Tamil Ceylonese of the North.  These newcomers became know as the "Plantation Tamils"

World Wars came and went and after World War Two, colonialism faded slowly from most parts of the world.  Ceylon was no different.  After the struggle for Indian Independence was won, the British were pretty tired of the whole thing and gave up Ceylon as well.  In the late 1940's, Ceylon became Sri Lanka.  

With independence came a shift of power to the elite English-speaking classes in Sri Lanka.  Over the years from the forming of the new nation until the early 1970's, the Sinhala power base enacted laws that began to disenfranchise the Tamils of the North, particularly the former "Plantation Tamils".  As an inevitable consequense of one segment of the population becoming disenfranchised, a Tamil Independence movement arose, eventually to become know as the Tamil Tigers. 

There were sporadic attacks and reprisals as the movements coalesced, but eventually a full scale civil war erupted, which was to last for 30 years.  This became the longest running conflict in Asia and, I believe, the second longest civil war in modern history, just a bit shorter than the civil war in Eritrea.  Peace was finally brokered in 2009 and since then the nation hs prospered, despite being slammed by the Tsunami of 2004.

When I speak to folks here, not always clear whether they are Tamil, Sinhala or some other folk, the universal sentiment expressed about the coming of peace is one of a huge relief.  Three decades of fighting is amazing and horrific in and of itself, but three decades of fighting contained on a small island nation is particularly brutal.  

So, thus is my little primer on The Kingdom of Ceylon.  The next time you sip some Ceylon Tea, you may have a little better idea of where it comes from.