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- This is a list of Sri Lankan Moors. Sri Lankan Moors (Tamil: இலங்கைச் சோனகர், romanized: Ilaṅkaic Cōṉakar; Sinhala: ලංකා යෝනක, romanized: Lanka Yonaka formerly Ceylon Moors; colloquially referred to as Muslims or Moors) are the minority ethnic group in Sri Lanka, comprising 9.3% of the country's total population. They are mainly native speakers of the Tamil language with influence of Sinhalese and Arabic words, however, some of them use Sinhalese as their native tongue. They are predominantly followers of Islam. The Moors trace their ancestry to Arab traders who settled in Sri Lanka in waves beginning from the 8th century. The population of Moors are the highest in the Ampara, Trincomalee and Batticaloa districts. The Portuguese named the Muslims in India and Sri Lanka after the Muslim Moors they met in Iberia. The word Moors did not exist in Sri Lanka before the arrival of the Portuguese colonists. The term 'Moor' was chosen because of the Islamic faith of these people, and was not a reflection of their origin. The Tamil term for Moors is Sonakar, which is thought to be derived from the word sunni. The Tamil term Sonakar along with the Sinhalese term Yonaka, has been thought to have been derived from the term Yona, a term originally applied to Greeks, but sometimes also Arabs. (en)
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