InSri Lanka, the namesMestiços (Portuguese for "Mixed People") orCasados ("Married") referred to people of mixedPortuguese and Sri Lankan (Sinhalese andTamil) descent. The names can be traced back to the 16th century.
The firstmestiços descended from Portuguese explorers, soldiers and merchants who reached Ceylon (an earliername of Sri Lanka) after the pioneering voyage ofVasco da Gama.
When theDutch East India Company took over coastal Ceylon, the descendants of themestiços took refuge in the central hills ofKingdom of Kandy under Sinhalese rule.
By the middle of the 18th century, the descendants of themestiços had partly merged with descendants of the Dutch, giving rise to aEurasian community (a mixture of Portuguese, Dutch, Sinhalese and Tamil), known as the Burghers. Some of these people spoke Portuguese, others spokeDutch. Later, the Burgher community developed into two different communities: the Dutch Burghers and thePortuguese Burghers.
The Portuguese presence in Ceylon was extended to non-urban areas, there is a wide Portuguese heritage in Sri Lankan society, culture and administration.Lexicon of Portuguese origin can be found in theSinhala language (at least 1,000 words), there may be more but insufficient study has been carried out.
