A chapter from a Text book called
System of Geography by
M. Malte-Brun (1775-1826)
Containing
a Description of all the Empires, Kingdoms, States and
Provinces in the known World, with additions and corrections by James G. Percival.
Printed and published by Samuel Walker,
Boston 1834.
It is published in 3 Volumes, and the chapters are called Books. Volume I contains 640 pages of which the first 23 chapters in 213 pages on the general theory of Geography. In the remaining 35 chapters on Asia, 105 pages is on India called INDOSTAN in 5 chapters, one of which with 15 pages (pp. 498-512) is on Ceylon; - Book XLIX. INDOSTAN CONTINUED.
Malthe Konrad Bruun (1775-1826) born in Denmark was educated in the University of Copenhagen, later settled in Paris; where he was known as Malte-Brun. This encyclopedic geography translated from French appears to have been a school geography text book of that era.
The description of Ceylon in the early 1820's is as it was just after the full island was taken over as a British Colony in 1815. Long before labour was imported from south India to develop tea plantations. I quote
"The inhabitants may be divided into the aboriginal race, and naturalized foreigners. Of the former, who are called Singalese, the inhabitants of the interior exclusively consist. The greater part of the naturalized foreigners are Malabars and Moors. The Malabars are confined chiefly to the northern and eastern parts, while the Moors are scattered over all the maritime districts.
In the description of Jaffna it says The native inhabitants are Malabars, one half of whom are of the Brahminical religion, the other consists of Christians, with a very few Mahometans.
It is relevant to the discussions and analysis in view of recent claims of traditional homelands, to note that Malabar now called Kerala is on the Western Coast, distinct from Coromandel now called TamilNadu on the Eastern Coast of south India.
Also interesting is the lack of any description of the Ancient cities
of Anuradhapura, Polonnaruva and Sigiriya of which very little was
known at that time.
From the 1803 An account of the Island of Ceylon by Robert Percival
I quote
In the northern part of the Kingdom lies the province of Noure
Calava, where the ruins of the once famous and splendid city of
Anurodgburo are still discovered. ... Owing to the distance of
Anurodgburo from Candy, and the terrors of the barbarous court, it is
much frequented by priests and other Cinglese, who come here to pay
devotion to their saints.
The book is available in many US Libraries.
In 1995 March in Baltimore I was able to buy an original copy from which
I have now OCR'ed Book XLIX and edited it
into HTML.
I hope you enjoy reading this short glimpse of Lanka from the past.
It is about 15,500 words, and may be printed if desired in about 20 pages.
I have edited some spelling to make it
more readable, and separated out the last section on the Maldiva Islands but otherwise intact.
Please send any comments or report any OCR errors to
me
