Anthropologists consider them to be partly descended from the indigenous Vedda people, as well as local Tamils.
The deity at Kataragama is indigenous and long-celebrated in Sri Lankan lore and legend, and originally resides on the top of mountain called Wædahiti Kanda (or hill of the indigenous Vedda people) just outside of the Kataragama town.
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Till today the indigenous Vedda people come to venerate at the temple complex from their forest abodes.
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As a link to the Vedda past, the temple holds its annual festival that celebrates the God's courtship and marriage to a Vedda princess in July to August.
The Bibile family claimed descent from a 16th-century Vedda chieftain.
From a sociological point of view it could mean the assimilation of ethno cultural minorities in Sri Lanka such as the Sri Lankan Tamils, Colombo Chetties and indigenous Veddas into the majority Sinhalese identity.
These dialects are also used by ethnic groups other than Tamils such as Sinhalese people, Sri Lankan Moors and Veddas, who consider them to be distinct.
Vedda |
The chief proponent of the dialect theory was Wilhelm Geiger, but he also contradicted himself by claiming that Vedda was a relexified aboriginal language.
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The first comprehensive study of the language was undertaken by Manikku W. Sugathapala de Silva in 1959; he along with K. N. O Dharmadasa have put forward the view that Vedda is a Creole.