Karaiyar, also known as Karayar, Karaiar or Kurukulam is traditionally both a seafaring and warrior caste found in the Tamil Nadu state of India, coastal areas of Sri Lanka,
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and globally among the Tamil Diaspora, occupying a large variety of educated and respectable professions.
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Origins
The Karaiyar, along with Mukkuvar and Paravar, are one of the oldest groups of the coastal region of Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka. They are predominantly found in the area known as Coromandal coast. These three seafaring related social groups are regionally distributed, with each group dominating a certain coastal belt. Seafaring activities include trading, coastal fishing, and naval activities. They are mentioned by Ptolemy as Kareoi – the tribe inhabiting the eastern coast that once extended south of Cape Comari in ancient Tamilakam. In Tamil, Karaiyar means "coast men".
Karaiyar culture in Ceylon has historically extolled Corsican virtues of refined far-sighted justice along with martial courage and defiance against foreign impositions. Karaiyar are also found north of Tanjore in Tamil Nadu and well into the Andhra Pradesh coastal areas. Moreover, there has been significant intermarriage between the Karaiyar and Marawar caste, another warrior caste of Tamil Nadu descended from Pandyans that were hunted down and almost wiped out during the pogroms against undesirables after the failed Indian Mutiny.
A significant part of this community consists of the traditional warrior and naval community of Sri Lanka, which were disempowered after the fall of the northern and southern kingdoms to Europeans. For more information about the corresponding martial caste of the Sinhalese in Sri Lanka, see Karava.
Traditional occupation
Karaiyars have traditionally been naval warriors, but engaged in activities related to boat building, overseas trading, and fishing during peacetime. They have also provided mercenary forces and considered most valorous by local kings in India and Sri Lanka. A great many of them after foreign impositions by Europeans (18th Century C.E) led lives as coastal fishermen and a significant minority became petty and wealthy chiefs and merchants in both countries.
Sanskritisation
Along with South Indian groups such as the Pandyans, who historically claim a lineage of the Pandavas according to tradition, it appears Kurukulam comes from the Kurus in Mahabharata and Kshatriya origin. The concept of Sanskritisation has been widely discredited, as phylogenetically and culturally, members of the Dravidian and Indo-Aryan groups have been mixing and similarly the lexicons and myths [1] since 200 B.C.E at the most latest. It is in fact an old misleading prejudice among those whose lineage were recently raised to Brahmanhood through fiscal means, that other castes such as Karaiyars were not of the origins claimed in their histories but acted out of mean interests for their supposed "advancement" and good opinion of others, like the authors of the prejudice. It should be noted that the few disregarded commentators, with qualifications unrelated to the field of history, have continued to perpetuate the misconception of Sanskritisation.
Position in Sri Lanka
In Sri Lanka, where they form over 10% of the country's total population, they are an upwardly mobile and relatively upgraded caste amongst the majority Sinhalese and minority Sri Lankan Tamils since the departure of the British whose rule promoted the more numerous, commercial, and obedient caste who were lower on the ancient Hindu Varna system, namely the Vellalars (farming and agricultural caste), to positions of civil power(see Caste in Sri Lanka). In otherwords, during the British and colonial rule, an inversion of the caste system took place, an attempt to disfranchise the ruling lineages and warrior castes. This is often not recognized conveniently among certain Vellalars, who tend to confuse the historical cause and effect, to the detriment of the Karaiyars, leading them to be convinced of their pride. Nevertheless, Catholicized Karaiyar have made up a significant portion of the police force and navy, proportionally of any caste during British rule. Amongst the Sinhalese, Karaiyar's are known as the Karave. Analysis of family names and traditions of Karave in Sri Lanka indicates that it has accepted within its fold many indigenous and migrant peoples from India and abroad. The Karaiyar of Sri Lanka and India differ from each other in significant manner due to their relative social and political positions.
Karaiyar and their politics
The Karaiyar amongst Sri Lankan Tamils are currently overwhelmingly represented in the Tamil rebel group LTTE who were compelled to take up arms after a series of discriminatory legislation targeting Ceylon Tamils soon after Independence from Britain and after all means of peaceful action proved fruitless. On the other hand, Karave are very vocal about their Sinhala Buddhist identity and drive the nationalistic political parties such as the SLFP and JVP. Some sociologist attempted to marginalize the civil conflict and have made very untenable comments based on oversimplification of cultural consciousness in groups by interpreting the current civil war in Sri Lanka as a vehicle by which both the Karaiyar and Karave have attempted to marginalize the preceding elites by taking extremely partisan but opposite views.
See also
References
- ^ [|Southworth, Franklin C. Southworth] (1979). "Lexical evidence for early contacts between Indo-Aryans and Dravidans". Aryan and non-Aryan in India (ed. M. Deshpande & P. Hook).
- RAGHAVAN, M. D., The Karava of Ceylon - Society and Culture, K. V. G. de Silva, 1961.
External links
- Karaiyar in the service of Jaffna Kingdom
- Tamil militarism of Karaiyar due to Maravar mixing in Jaffna by late journalist Taraki Sivaram
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