The Adaptable Peasant: Agrarian Society in Western Sri Lanka under Dutch Rule, 1740-1800This study investigates the structural changes in western Sri Lanka's agrarian society under the administration of the Dutch United East India Company (VOC). In the areas where peasant agriculture was the predominant form of production, changes in the land tenure system paved the way for a modern system of private property relations. A new class differentiation emerged and the indigenous chiefs turned into powerful landowners. In addition to this, new light is shed on the dynamics of caste formation as a result of the early colonial encounter. |
Contents
Prologue | 1 |
Introduction | 3 |
The World of the Peasant | 25 |
The System of Production and Its Changes | 59 |
Land Tenure and Its Changes | 105 |
The Emergence of a New Class Formation and the Rise of a Landowning Class | 141 |
Caste and Social Mobility | 185 |
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______________________________________________________________________________________ Source absentee accommodessan grants accumulation capability Ach¯ari Alutkuru amuna amunu areas areca nut Badahäla Berava caste formation caste hierarchy Ceylon changes Chapter chena cultivation chenas Chetty cinnamon plantations coastal coconut plantations colonial centre colonial intervention Company Company’s demographic Dis¯ava discussed Dur¯ava Dutch economic families gama garden crops geographical Gorakadeniya Governor Goyigama caste Hakuru Hakuru caste Hina K¯orale Hina/Mäda historical holding ideology important indigenous chiefs Janawamsaya Kahambilihena Kandy Kandyan Kar¯ava king king’s Kotelawele Kotte kuruni land tenure landowning class Lascarins Leonard Blussé Mäda Mapitigama mayor¯al mid-eighteenth century mode Mudaliy¯ar Muhandiram naindes Negombo non-Goyigama Ogodapola formation ownership paddy paddy-fields paddy-lands Padu caste pangu parav¯eni Paravar peasant production PLH group political population population density Portuguese pre-colonial r¯ajak¯ariya Rad¯a region ritual status ruling class Sal¯agama Salpity settlement significant Silva Sinhala Sinhalese situation Sri Lanka structure surplus Table tenant term tion tombos trees v¯asagama vid¯ane villages Weliweriya