Shihan de Silva Jayasuriya, courtesy of THE CEYLANKAN, Vol XXI, No 3, August 2018 … with highlighting emphasis added by The Editor, Thuppahi
The extraordinary love of the Portuguese for music is epitomised at El Ksar el Kabir in Morocco, in 1578, where 10 000 guitars lay on the battlefield, near the dead Portuguese soldiers. The Portuguese took guns and guitars to battlefields! Is it surprising that the Portuguese presence is vibrant through Sri Lankan popular music – Baila?
Baila is a ballad in which the poetry is of paramount importance. A ballad is a short poem suitable for singing which was originally intended to accompany a dance. The etymology of ballad is ballare (late Latin/Italian) meaning ‘to dance’. Today the Portuguese word bailar meaning ‘to dance’ is used in the context of a Ball; dançar means ‘to dance’. Meanings of words change over time and place. The association of the word Baila with dance predominantly undervalues its balladic significance. Music, song and dance are closely knit forms of art and unsurprisingly, Baila refers to music, song and dance in Sri Lanka. This article concerns Baila in Sri Lanka. It does not concern Baila in South America or Europe where Latin languages prevail.
Sri Lanka’s Portuguese era is generally considered to have begun in 1505 when a ship sailing to the Maldives, captained by Lourenço de Almeida, was windswept to Galle. The encounter with the first European power is taken to have ended in 1658 with the fall of Jaffna and Mannar. Throughout Portuguese presence, the Kandyan kingdom remained under Sri Lankan rule, excepting for Batticaloa and Trincomalee which came under Portuguese domination from only the first half of the 17th century. The actual period of Portuguese domination in Sri Lanka was no more than 60 years. Yet the Portuguese legacy, particularly the intangible heritage, has been remarkably durable in underscoring the 1540 prediction of the Portuguese chronicler, João de Barros: “The Portuguese arms and pillars placed in Africa and in Asia, and in countless isles beyond the bounds of three continents, are material objects, that would be destroyed over time but time would not destroy the religion, customs and language that the Portuguese implanted in those lands” [my translation].
In 1974, the Swasangeetha (‘Our Songs’) programme sponsored by the Associated Motorways Group of Companies (Colombo), televised by Rupavāhini in Sri Lanka, reported Batticaloa Burgher (Sri Lankans with European ancestry) music and songs as Kaffrinha and their dance as Baila. But the dances of the Batticaloa Burghers are Kaffrinha and Lancers. The confusion between Kaffrinha and Baila continues to-date. A few years later, in 1976, the Catholic Burgher Union (Batticaloa) compiled a booklet of cantigas (songs) with religious and secular themes. Batticaloa ballads are linked to Romances, one of the oldest and most important genres of Portuguese sung poetry which survives only in northern Portugal, Trás- os-Montes and the Atlantic archipelago which belongs to Portugal, Azores, and also in north eastern Brazil.
When the BBC World Routes team visited Batticaloa in September 2011, they were astonished to hear these centuries-old musical traditions. Vivid descriptions by Dr. Lucy Duran, an ethnomusicologist at the University of London, are on the BBC website. A few Batticaloa songs are linked to Sinhala Bailas. Bailas are also sung in Tamil, English, Sri Lanka Malay and Sri Lanka Portuguese. The Sinhala Baila, Māla Giravī (‘parrot’) is sung to the tune of the Batticaloa song Terra Iste Terra (‘Land this land’) and the Sinhala baila, Mee Vadayaki Jeevithe (‘Life is a Honeycomb’) is sung as Vi Minha Amor por Baila (‘Come my Love to dance’) in Batticaloa. Sinhala lyrics of these songs are different to the Sri Lanka Portuguese versions.
Kaffrinha’s Afro-Portuguese connection is signalled through its etymon: Kaffir is an ‘African’ an nha is the Portuguese diminutive. Kaffrinha could mean ‘a bit of African’. A c19th century manuscript in the Hugh Nevill Collection (British Library, London) includes six Kaffrinhas from the Eastern Province: Singellenona (‘Sinhalese Lady’), Korra Jannethaie (‘Blush Joanita’), Bastiahna (‘Bastiana’), Chekoetie (‘Whip’) and Ama die none Frencena (‘Love of Lady Francina’) plus one untitled song grouped as “Cantiga De Purtiegese – Kaffrein – Neger Song Portigiese” (‘Songs of the Portuguese—Kaffrinha—Portuguese Negro Songs’). There are no scores, however. My translations of these songs from Sri Lanka Portuguese into Standard Portuguese and English are in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (Sri Lanka) and also in my first book, Tagus to Taprobane (Tisara Prakasakayo, Sri Lanka)
C. M. Fernando, son of Sir Marcus Fernando, who graduated in Law from the University of Cambridge was the pioneer researcher of Portuguese music in Sri Lanka. After presenting his seminal paper in 1894, to the Royal Asiatic Society (Colombo), he accompanied, on the piano, the ‘Ceylon Portuguese’ orchestra which consisted of a banderinha (mandolin), viaule (tenor violin) and rabana (tamborine).
The titles of scores published by Fernando and titles of songs in the Nevill manuscript (19th century) are similar: Singallenona (‘Sinhalese Lady’), Bastiana (‘Bastiana’), Chikothi (‘Whip’) and Coran Janita (‘Blush Joanita’). Kaffrinha’s African connection is confirmed through the titles of songs in Fernando’s paper: Velanda Mazambicu (Mozambican Town- dweller) and Caffri (African).
Fernando describes dances of the Portuguese Burghers as Chikothi and Cafferina [Kaffrinha]. A man and a woman, stand on opposite sides of a room and dance towards each other, exchanging old- fashioned courtesies when they meet in the middle of the room. The man waves a handkerchief and high steps to the beat while the lady lifts her long frilly skirt to manoeuvre the fast footsteps. Fernando contrasts the “Grotesque attitudes and alert movements” of the Kaffrinha with “the slow measures of the Chikothi” which call for “stately and dignified steps”.
In my attempts to identify Chikothi, I made comparisons with the Goan Catholic form of music, song and dance: Mando. TheMando is a stately dance with dignified steps. I interviewed Anthony Noronha, former Conductor of the Nairobi Symphony Orchestra, when he had settled in London. Noronha drew my attention to the folk character of the Mando masterfully conveyed by starting on a minor key and modulating to a major key. At my request, Noronha scored a Mando called Surya Noketranche Porim Porzolleta (‘You Shine just like the sun and the stars’) which is published in my book – Portuguese in the East: A Cultural History of a Maritime Trading Empire (London: I B Tauris). Goan forms of music and dance – Mando, Dulpod and Dekhni – are different to Baila and Kaffrinha due to the varied durations of contact with the Portuguese and the diverse indigenous influences.
C.M. Fernando distinguishes Kaffrinha (fast and in 6/8 time – six quavers to a bar and having a “peculiar jerky movement”) from Chikothi (in 3/8 time – three quavers to a bar and “slow and stately”). Fifty years before Fernando, Colonel Augustus de Butts in his book Rambles in Ceylon (1841), describes a “Caffre dance”. The dance somewhat resembled the fandango of Spain; but the resemblance, it must be confessed, was that of a caricature. Two individuals of opposite sexes gradually approach each other with an air of coquetry, making indescribable contortions and grimaces. The female slowly retires from the ardent advances of her lover, who, suiting the action to the word, endeavours to capture the fair fugitive, while he pours forth his tale of love in the most moving tropes that his eloquence can command.
‘The lady of his love’ at length abates somewhat of the air of scorn with which she at first affects to regard her impassioned swain, who, emboldened by this evidence of a favourable impression, and again alarmed at his own audacity, alternately advances towards and retreats from the object of his adoration.
This lively dance was popular with Europeans in Sri Lanka during the 19th century and by the early 20th century had filtered through to Sri Lankans who embraced western modernity. Twentieth century Kaffrinha arrangements by Norbert Rodrigo (Ceylonese Dances), Vincent Rodrigo (Ceylonese Lancers on Kaffrinha Airs and Professor Lord (Caffarina Quadrilles) consist of five movements. The well known Kaffrinha, Singale Nōna (‘Sinhalese Lady’), is within the three scores.
During the early 20th century Kaffrinha was danced in the fashionable Colombo suburb of Cinnamon Gardens, where all parties ended with Singale Nōona. Singale Nōna is today sung in Sinhala as “Yaman Selō Pēra Kadanne”. Kaffrinha is sparked off by cross rhythms and syncopations. Cross rhythms occur with interplay between 6/8 (six quavers to a bar) in the treble and 3/4 (three crotchets to a bar) in the bass. Syncopation involves shifting the accents to unorthodox places. Accenting the parts in-between beats or playing ‘off the beat’ drives the music and adds excitement to the performance. ‘Kaffir airs’ were published by Herr Somers, Band Master of the Ceylon Rifle Regiments, under the title After Supper Kaffir Quadrila, but his scores have not been traced so far.
Contexts and descriptions of Kaffrinha vary. Novelist, Carl Muller’s vivid descriptions in Jam Fruit Tree (1993): “… and revels they were. The band had arrived: three boys in bow ties, two fiddles and a tom-tom and Jessie Ferdinands produced a harmonica and Finny Jackson played the spoons, clickety-clack on his knees and a rollicking kaffrinja [Kaffrinha] set everybody in motion with Colontota’s uncles hitching up their sarongs and jerking around shouting ‘adi-ji adi-ji’ and the ladies holding the sides of their skirts and high-stepping to the beat”.
Kaffrinha can assume a comical character. In the late 19th century, C. Don Bastian, a pioneer Sinhala playwright, introduced Kaffrinha to the theatre through the jester singing a Kaffrinha at the start of Rolina Nādagama in 1879. In the 20th century, Ediriweera Sarachchandra, Sri Lanka’s foremost dramatist, identifies Kaffrinha as a body of music introduced by the Portuguese to Sri Lanka. Dēva Suriyasena, a pioneer of Sinhala music in the early 20th century, states that the lilting rhythm and tunes of Kaffrinha danced by Portuguese mercenaries, some of whom were Africans, fell on willing ears in the coastal areas.
Kaffrinha is also the traditional dance of the Batticaloa Burghers, calling for alert movements and accompanied by lively tunes. Typically, four couples perform Kaffrinha at weddings. Marriage ceremonies are not complete until the Kaffrinha is danced. The bride and groom open the dance and are followed by the bridesmaid and best man and two further couples. Dancing continues for a few hours with only short breaks between the five movements when the musicians change mode.
The father of Alex Van Arkadie, a Burgher, was a close acquaintance of Wally Bastianz, the composer of Chorus Baila (generally known in Sri Lanka as Baila). Van Arkadie recalls Colombo’s Kaffrinha dancers of the 1950s, travelling entertainers who performed once a year, in affluent Dutch Burgher houses. Instruments played were the viola, violin, rabāna (tambourine), triangle, piano accordion and gourd rattles (maracas). The most popular item in the variety entertainment show was the Kaffrinha, performed by a Burgher couple disguised as Africans by blackening their faces right down to the neck.
Fingers were encased in white hand gloves to cover their paler skin. The man wore a prominent red bow- tie which fluttered freely against his long-sleeved brightly coloured satin shirt, a long tail-coat and a black top-hat which he tipped each time he curtsied and bowed before the lady who swung her flared skirt provocatively in order to respond to his charming gestures. The woman wore a wig of raven black hair in a mass of fine curls bunched together in tassels to hang from under a neatly draped bandanna (‘scarf’ from the Portuguese word ‘banda’). A colourful pair of large ear-rings and a string of large beads plunged down from her neck to her heavily endowed, perhaps padded, bosom. Her taffeta blouse blended finely with her clothes but was in contrast to the man’s shirt. Her sleeves held layers of frills which dangled and danced down from her shoulders to the rhythm of the beat. The provocative swing of her hips was exacerbated by her pronounced hips, accentuated with a cushion. Her rich satin skirt was flashily decorated in polka dots all-over, or broad bands of coloured borders at the hemline, and her underskirt was lace-edged or hand- embroidered. The Kaffrinha was a feast of captivating colourful flashes, entrancing movements and jubilant sounds made to the cheers and yells of the audience.
Leopold Ludovici, a surveyor, who visited a Kaffir village in Puttalam at the end of the 19th century mistook the music, which he calls Kaffrinha, for being a fight. Kaffrinha is loud and energetic. The surveyor and writer, R. L. Brohier, described the music in a Puttalam village called Sellan Kandel, as Kaffrinha and Chikothi. He wrote in the 20th century that the ‘Kaffir-Portuguese Chikothi’ music had been absorbed into Sri Lankan popular culture, surfacing at gatherings which sought an outlet for hilarity – these were given the heterogeneous term Baila.
Afro-European links of Kaffrinha and Baila are rekindling an interest in the music of Sri Lankans with African and European ancestry. But the music of the largest Afro-Sri Lankan community in Sirambiyadiya (Puttalam) is not Kaffrinha. Because their ethnonym is Kaffir (from the Arabic word qafr which means ‘non- believer’ and was used for Africans by the Arabs) their music is mistakenly assumed to be Kaffrinha. Lyrics of Manhas are mostly in Sri Lanka Portuguese, but the melodies are distinct from the Batticaloa Cantigas (songs) and Kaffrinhas.
A genre known as Vāde Baila (‘debate Baila’), musical debates and contests of wit and repartée, were a popular form of entertainment in Sri Lanka. Sumathipala Perera, a leading Vāde Baila singer, formed a society to keep this form of art alive. This tradition is similar to canto ao desafio (Challenge Song) in Portugal and Brazil. Vāde Baila, perhaps due to its theatrical nature and demanding skills, has given way to Chorus Baila. The originator of Chorus Baila, Gajanayake Mudiyanselāge Ollington Mervin Bastianz (1913-1985), is better known as Wally Bastianz. A single recording with 14 of his best known songs, released in 2004 by Torana (Colombo), sing out the poetry of the exotic performer which gripped the people. The simplicity of Bastianz’s narratives and the realities that he addressed and played out with catchy rhythms, popularised Bailas. Bastianz was a brilliant lyricist, an educator and a critic. He evoked sentimental feelings of a nation whose values were distorted and strained by 450 years of western domination.
Wally Bastianz felt the pulse of the people and articulated their emotions by accentuating the heartbeat of Sri Lanka through his compositions of Chorus Baila
Wally Bastianz was called ‘The Exotic Ceylonese Performer’ when he featured in Colombo’s night clubs. He was a versatile musician: he played the banjo, piano, ukulele, Spanish guitar, Sri Lankan viaule and accordion. His band included Aelian Soysa, Marshall Wambeck, Anton Johns, Maxi Leonard and Morris Fernando. Bastianz sang in Sinhala, Tamil, English, Malay and Sri Lanka Portuguese, reaching out to all Sri Lankans.
Listeners must understand the lyrics to fully appreciate Chorus Baila. Its value is not simply in the music. Ronald Walcott, an American musicologist, in his doctoral thesis submitted to the University of Sri Jayewardenepura (Sri Lanka), in 1978, highlights the poetic value of Baila which surpasses all else in importance. Traditionalists may be sceptical but they cannot disagree that Baila stirs Sri Lankans and as Aelian Soysa sings: “Lankavata Baila gena Wally Bastianz, Baila valin rata hollapu Baila champion” (‘Wally Bastianz, who gave Baila to Sri Lanka was the Baila champion who moved the country with Baila’) in a song dedicated to the maestro who changed the entertainment field in Sri Lanka and carved out a new identity for the Nation.
Maya Abeywickrama (2006) maps a few Bailas on to Western music – Hai hui Babi Achchige baisikel eka (Granny Babi’s Bicycle) on to a well- known march, ‘Repasz Band’, composed by Charles Sweeney. Another popular Baila, associated with Moratuwa, a town from where many Baila singers originate, Pun Sanda Pāya Moratuwa Dilennā (Moratuwa is shining under the full moon) is mapped on to ‘On the Beach of Bali Bali’, a Hawaiian song. Bailas are also influenced by other types of foreign music now. Baila has become a conduit for almost every major international popular musical trend, from Minstrelsy, Hawaiian, Country-Western, Caribbean Calypso, Zairian Soukous, north Mexican Mariachi and Disco.
Gerald Wickremasooriya of Sooriya Records moved Baila into the age of rock ‘n’ roll by including electric guitars, drum kits and synthesisers. Baila has travelled overseas with the Sri Lankan diaspora. Since Bastianz, Baila has evolved through different styles sung by soloists and groups. The dynamics of Baila has strengthened its popularity as the changing tastes of generations are absorbed and played out. As Sri Lanka discovered and explored her post-independent identity, Baila became more indigenised.
The word Baila has assumed the meaning ‘song’: Vāda Baila, Kāvadi Baila, Kāpiri Baila, Paraguayan Baila, Chorus Baila, Kapiriñña (Kaffrinha) Baila and Nidahasa (Independence) Baila. More importantly, Chorus Baila is confused with Vāda Baila as Wally Bastianz was a Vāda Baila singer when he composed Chorus Baila which instantaneously became popular. Chorus Baila is neither an import from Portugal nor a genre that was introduced by the Portuguese. Chorus Baila compositions were influenced by the Afro-Portuguese genre Kaffrinha and Vāda Baila.
Chorus Baila signifies a new post-colonial identity, which represents the transformed Nation. Bastianz felt the pulse of the people and articulated their emotions by accentuating the heartbeat of Sri Lanka through his compositions of Chorus Baila.
*** ***
ALSO VISIT
* Prasad Jayamanna: “Lost Culture. Unique Sri Lankan-African Language Fading Into Obscurity…,” 19 September 2017, https://thecatamaran.org/2017/09/19/unique-sri-lankan-african-language-fading-into-obscurity/
* Kannan Arunasalem: “Kaffir culture in Sri Lanka,” 15 November 2012, http://originalpeople.org/video-kaffir-culture-in-sri-lanka-india/
- The Sidi Project, http://thesidiproject.com/tag/sri-lanka/
What excellent site you have! The baila article is most informative. Could you keep me posted? I write on SL myself – books, though. Ayu bowan.
Good Morning,
Well! throughout this long well documented article it is clear that Africans in Sri Lanka dating back to the Portuguese (very few were left alive) and Dutch periods (150years) were influenced in their music by the Baila introduced by the Portuguese during their 150 year period of presence. The physical presence of Portuguese is different for Batticaloa and Trincomalee, because they were present for only 18 years, but which in Batticaloa they left the largest and most cohesive group of Portuguese/Burghers, and the reasons are well documented in the history of Sri Lanka.
Different is the English period which, not having imported slaves in Sri Lanka, imported from the Colonies of their vast Empire various types of Africans who were employed in the Colonial Administration and also musicians among which two remained very famous in the 20th century, namely: Miss. Great Janette De Silva and Mr. Henry Red Allen
It is now clear that the Africans from the village of Sirambiydiya (Puttalam) who arrived in Sri Lanka with their families (women and children) from Mozambique followed a work contract stipulated with the British authorities together with another group of African families settled in the China Bay area, in the village of Palaiyoouthu (Trincomalee).
These two Creole Portuguese speaking groups were employed as workers in the two British concentration camps for prisoners of war.
This Africans could not exchange information with people outside the concentration camps due to their linguistic gap with local populations.
These African orderlies were also employed in heavy work by the British around the island.
Now the China Bay group, after the war, has mainly remained in Sri Lanka and has spread throughout the island by wedding with local people, creating hearths in the Creolo Portuguese language (there are also mixed marriages with the Portuguese Burghers of Batticaloa) and this also created the false myth of their descent from the Portuguese Era and their marriages have led people to falsely think that there was a community of Portuguese Burghers in Trincomalee where instead there is an African Burgher community of native Portuguese Creole language.
The African Community of Sirambiydiya after the war, has mainly remained in Sri Lanka, and is the more famous African Community and much visited by historians. Even here there is the false theory that they were a community descended from the Portuguese Era of Sri Lanka. Instead both this Community and that of China Bay arrived in Sri Lanka in 1940.
It is Baila Portuguese music (Traditional Music) with all its variations that has influenced the African music of Sri Lanka and not vice versa, as is often claimed.
Having read so many theories, I will send you mine as quickly possible; my research where in my opinion the first real influence of Portuguese Baila music influences the Sinhalese people.
Regards with liking Piero Perondi
Thanks Michael for copying me text. Currrently in Mangalore, India, where Portuguese Baila influence had a big impact on Goanese entertainment, music, and dancing and accordingly influence much of Mangalorean entertainment scene especially among the Christian communities. until 11 Sep. Will get back to you thereafter. /alex.van arkadie
15 Sep.2018 – Thanks again, dear Michael.
Back to Home-sweet-Rome from our 3-wk. family visit in Mangalore where
I listened to many Goanese and Mangalorean inspired baila singing (not kaffirignas, though) between 16 Aug to 10 Sep. with our families and friends in Karnataka (my spouse originally from Mangalore, India).
Allow me share my comment on the learned author’s well-researched subject through.which I aim to give further credit to Ceylon’s most prominent entertainer and beloved lyricist Wally Bastianz. It was Wally who first sang in Sinhala the very popular and highly ‘satirical’ Baila of the 50’s titled, “Yaman Bando vesak balanna; Permit me knit together the English translation (but with no intentional offence toward ‘native ceylonese’ from our colonial era).
Colonials named their young male servants whom they brought along to the City from estates and plantations in distant villages ‘Banda’. The familiar character was tagged as a common nickname even in latter day sinhala walauv-kaara bangalavas whom they fashionably employed as all-inclusive kokiyas, buggy-carters, dustmen, gardeners, house-orderlies,gatekeepers, watchmen, etc. etc. Every affable countryside ‘banda’ thus transformed to be associated with native simpletons. Even ‘ceylonized’ sinhala formula films of the 50s cleverly captured and projected common household domestic helpers in comical or satirical roles as in the popular ‘ayah-appu’ or ‘manappu’ and ‘josi-baba’ roles (eg. played by the Late Eddie Jayamanne and Mabel Blythe).
‘Banda’ was Wally’s favourite creation whom he felicitated in his ‘Yaman Bando’ in song as well in imitative dance, whenever performed before his enraptured fans (many times even at our Dematagoda home – when children, and adult men and women in the entire neighbourhood including passers-by gathered to see Radio Ceylon’s baila entertainer ‘live in song and action with his viola or spanish guitar. His chorus-line read: “Yaman Bando Vesak balanna; Ganin bara-baage bandinna; Paara dige eli bala bala, maha paare hari kalabala; Yaman Bando vesak balanna.” My English translation: ‘Hey Bando, let’s go see Vesak; Fetch and harness the bullock to the cart; Enjoying the lights on the roadways,where there is much excitement; Bando let’s go see Vesak” … thereby cordially inviting the village simpleton to a loiter under city lights along the crowded busy streets of Colombo. .
My appreciation for the singer Wally and his song is barely adequate to render homage to Sri Lanka’s greatest entertainer of the last Century and May he remain even moreso thro. the on-going years of this 21st Century. May what he introduced and promoted in former Ceylon and Today’s Sri Lanka remain always fresh, fragrant and high value for future generations to enjoy. Finally, may my favourite uncle Wally continue to entertain his fans with the angels and choirs of heaven … just as he desired in his earthly wish, “Viole … viole maagey”.
THANK YOU! An Excellent
article!
So very interesting, Michael, as always!
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Good Morning,
Well! throughout this long well documented article it is clear that Africans in Sri Lanka dating back to the Portuguese (very few were left alive) and Dutch periods (150years) were influenced in their music by the Baila introduced by the Portuguese during their 150 year period of presence. The physical presence of Portuguese is different for Batticaloa and Trincomalee, because they were present for only 18 years, but which in Batticaloa they left the largest and most cohesive group of Portuguese/Burghers, and the reasons are well documented in the history of Sri Lanka.
Different is the English period which, not having imported slaves in Sri Lanka, imported from the Colonies of their vast Empire various types of Africans who were employed in the Colonial Administration and also musicians among which two remained very famous in the 20th century, namely: Miss. Great Janette De Silva and Mr. Henry Red Allen
It is now clear that the Africans from the village of Sirambiydiya (Puttalam) who arrived in Sri Lanka with their families (women and children) from Mozambique followed a work contract stipulated with the British authorities together with another group of African families settled in the China Bay area, in the village of Palaiyoouthu (Trincomalee).
These two Creole Portuguese speaking groups were employed as workers in the two British concentration camps for prisoners of war.
This Africans could not exchange information with people outside the concentration camps due to their linguistic gap with local populations.
These African orderlies were also employed in heavy work by the British around the island.
Now the China Bay group, after the war, has mainly remained in Sri Lanka and has spread throughout the island by wedding with local people, creating hearths in the Creolo Portuguese language (there are also mixed marriages with the Portuguese Burghers of Batticaloa) and this also created the false myth of their descent from the Portuguese Era and their marriages have led people to falsely think that there was a community of Portuguese Burghers in Trincomalee where instead there is an African Burgher community of native Portuguese Creole language.
The African Community of Sirambiydiya after the war, has mainly remained in Sri Lanka, and is the more famous African Community and much visited by historians. Even here there is the false theory that they were a community descended from the Portuguese Era of Sri Lanka. Instead both this Community and that of China Bay arrived in Sri Lanka in 1940.
It is Baila Portuguese music (Traditional Music) with all its variations that has influenced the African music of Sri Lanka and not vice versa, as is often claimed.
Having read so many theories, I will send you mine as quickly possible; my research where in my opinion the first real influence of Portuguese Baila music influences the Sinhalese people.
Regards with liking Piero Perondi
PIERO
IT woud be wise to reqork this COMMENT as a separate ESSAY for Thuppahi with maps, specific dates where feasible, footnote references and a BIBLIOGRAPHY. Pl send it to me [MY EMAIL] as adraft in WORD FILEand I can then smoothen the English wording.
Do take note of the historical references in Hugh Nevill: SINHALA VERSE and the data (plus biblio references0 in my book Sinhala Consciousness in the Kandyan Period, 1590s-1818″ Colombo: Yapa Publications, 2004 …. AND the other sources which I have used.therein.
As a child living in Gintota, Galle in the mid 1940s , I often saw dark-skinned soldiers marching along Galle Rd.. Much later, I learnt that they were soldiers from the Kaffir Regiment of the British Army, which had engaged around 6000 Kaffirs in Ceylon. (Herath 2014).
The Dutch reportedly employed over 1000 Kaffirs in the construction of the Galle Fort (https://www.galleheritage.gov.lk/en/dutch-town-plan-and-architectural-features-of-galle-fort/)& 4000 others on various other duties.. (Herath, 2014).
There have been Kaffirs even in the Kandyan Kingdom during the Dutch period & the Mandaram Puwatha has recorded that there was an attempt by a few Kaffirs to poison Ven. Welivita Sri Saranankara Thero, (who was spearheading a Buddhist revival) at the instance of a Goan Catholic priest.
It is the Portuguese who first brought in large numbers of Kaffirs, reported to be around 3000 from East African countries as slaves to perform various duties, including that of soldiers. (Herath, 2014).
The descendants of some of these Kaffirs today live in certain parts of the west (Negombo, Puttalam areas ) & east (Trincomalee, Batticaloa areas ), of the country &. The features of the elderly are clearly African. They seem to believe that their ancestors were brought to Ceylon by the Portuguese. (Joseph, 2022). They enjoy singing, dancing & playing music on family occasions . They have also performed at well known public venues. The language used for communication by the Portuguese & the Kaffirs was Portuguese Creole.
Kaffringha is believed to have emanated from a fusion of African & Portuguese dance & music &. If their ancestors came here during the time of the Portuguese, Kaffringha should be a part of their cultural heritage. However, they claim that their dance & music is known as ‘manja’ , & it is not clear why they have taken up this position (O’connor, 2008).
Another ethnic group which used Creole for communication was the Portuguese Burghers in Batticaloa. They were descendants of Portuguese men who had married Sinhala or Tamil women. (Herath, 2014). Kaffringha is part of their cultural heritage, & it means that the Kaffirs in the Trincomalee area may have provided inputs to their dance & music.
Sri Lankan baila has evolved from Kaffringha tunes in the 1940s with Sinhala lyrics, improved musical instruments , & different styles as pointed out in the above article by a well-known academic, who has written extensively, conducted lectures, & given numerous interviews on various aspects of African migration to Asia as well as Kaffringha & Baila.
REFERENCES:
Herath G, (2014), Creole culture in Sri Lanka , https://www.nation.sc/archive/241335/creole-culture-in-sri-lanka.
O’Connor M, (2009), https://www.sundaytimes.lk/081109/Plus/sundaytimesplus_10.html
Getting to know the Kaffirs through music and dance
Joseph D (2022,) https://thuppahis.com/2022/01/29/kaffir-traditions-vibrant-traces-at-sirambiyadi-off-puttalam/
Wonderful insight into Baila, the Kaffirs in the British regiment stationed in Galle, and the original name of Puttalam.
I was born in Ceylon, now Sri Lanka, in1950 and lived there till 1977 and am enlightened thanks to this blog.
Mr. Marikar,
nice information, but I think some thing is wrong.
I have never seen and read that European or African soldiers in the service of European nations could bring wives and children with them during their period of service. Also, if they were British soldiers, they had to know the English language.
Instead here there is a lot of blah, blah, blah talk of Creole-Portuguese-speaking Africans, which also was for a long time the tongue franca of the Western Coasts of Sri Lanka, mostly spoken by the Sinhalese of the Karava caste, and with who wanted to communicate with them.
Therefore I am not at all enlightened by this Blog, on this topic, I look forward to someone illuminating this dark page of history, with unequivocal evidence.
But on this theory of the African communities of Puttalam and China Bay as descendants from the Portuguese Era of Sri Lanka, there is no evidence, only fanciful theories.
Ciao Piero Perondi
Hi Mr. Mo Marikar,
Nice information, but I think some thing is wrong.
I have never seen and read that European or African soldiers in the service of European nations could bring wives and children with them during their period of service.
Also, if they were British soldiers, they had to know the English language.
Instead here there is a lot of blah, blah, blah talk of Creole-Portuguese-speaking Africans, which also was for a long time the tongue franca of the Western Coasts of Sri Lanka, mostly spoken by the Sinhalese of the Karava caste, and with who wanted to communicate with them or through them.
Therefore I am not at all enlightened by this Blog, on this topic, I look forward to someone illuminating this dark page of history, with unequivocal evidence.
But on this theory of the African communities of Puttalam and China Bay as descendants from the Portuguese Era of Sri Lanka, there is no evidence, only great fanciful theories.
Ciao with liking Piero