Dutch Ceylon in the context of "Kingdom of Kandy"

Burgher people, also known simply as Burghers, are a small Eurasian ethnic group in Sri Lanka descended from Portuguese, Dutch, British and other Europeans who settled in Ceylon. The Portuguese and Dutch had held some of the maritime provinces of the island for centuries before the advent of the British Empire. Burgher people are often referred to as belonging to one of two sub-groups, either Dutch Burghers or Portuguese Burghers, though both are of mixed descent.

Most of those who retained close ties with the Netherlands departed with the establishment of British Ceylon as a crown colony at the end of the 18th century. However, a significant community of Burghers remained and largely adopted the English language. During British rule, they occupied a highly important place in Sri Lankan social and economic life. Portuguese settlers were mostly traders who formed colonies. Lisbon did not discourage European settlement—even to the extent of advocating intermarriage with the Sinhalese. This was not encouraged by the Sinhalese. It was not the policy of the Dutch East India Company to endorse similar unions, although unofficial liaisons between its employees and local women occurred in the late eighteenth century.

The Dutch Cape Colony (Dutch: Nederlandse Kaapkolonie), officially known as the Cape of Good Hope Waystation (Dutch: Tussenstation Kaap de Goede Hoop), was a colony of the Dutch East India Company (VOC) and Batavian Republic in Southern Africa. Centered on the Cape of Good Hope, from where it derived its name, it was founded in 1652 by a VOC expedition under Jan van Riebeeck to serve as a re-supply and layover port for VOC vessels trading with Asia. The Cape was under VOC rule from 1652 to 1795 and Batavian rule from 1803 to 1806. Much to the dismay of the VOC's shareholders, who focused primarily on making profits from the Asian trade, the Cape Colony rapidly expanded into a settler colony in the years after its founding.

As the only permanent settlement of the VOC which served as a trading post, it proved an ideal retirement place for employees of the company. After several years of service in the company, an employee could lease a piece of land in the Cape Colony as a Free Burgher, on which he had to cultivate crops that he had to sell to the VOC for a fixed price. As these farms were labour-intensive, Free Burghers imported slaves from Madagascar, Mozambique and Asia (mostly the Dutch East Indies and Dutch Ceylon), which rapidly increased the number of inhabitants. After King Louis XIV of France issued the Edict of Fontainebleau in October 1685 (revoking the Edict of Nantes of 1598), thereby ending protection of the right of Huguenots in France to practise Protestant worship without persecution from the state, the Cape Colony attracted some Huguenot settlers, who eventually mixed with the general Dutch population.

Dutch India (Dutch: Nederlands Voor-Indië) consisted of the settlements and trading posts of the Dutch East India Company on the Indian subcontinent. It is only used as a geographical definition, as there was never a political authority ruling all Dutch India. Instead, Dutch India was divided into the governorates Dutch Ceylon and Dutch Coromandel, the commandment Dutch Malabar, and the directorates Dutch Bengal and Dutch Suratte.

The Dutch Indies, on the other hand, were the Dutch East Indies (present-day Indonesia) and the Dutch West Indies (present-day Suriname and the former Netherlands Antilles).

Theravada Buddhism is the largest and official religion of Sri Lanka, practiced by 70.1% of the population as of 2012. Practitioners of Sri Lankan Buddhism can be found amongst the majority Sinhalese population as well as among the minority ethnic groups, most notably the Sri Lankan Chinese. Sri Lankan Buddhists share many similarities with Southeast Asian Buddhists, specifically Thai Buddhists and Burmese Buddhists due to traditional and cultural exchange. Sri Lanka is one of only five countries in the world with a Theravada Buddhist majority, and others are Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar.

Buddhism has been declared as the state religion under Article 9 of the Sri Lankan Constitution which can be traced back to an attempt to bring the status of Buddhism back to the status it enjoyed prior to the Dutch and British colonial eras. Sri Lanka is one of the oldest traditionally Buddhist countries.

The Peranakan Chinese (/pəˈrɑːnəˌkɑːn, -kən/) are an ethnic group defined by their genealogical descent from the first waves of Southern Chinese settlers to maritime Southeast Asia, known as Nanyang (Chinese: 南洋; pinyin: nán yáng; lit. 'Southern Ocean'), namely the British, Portuguese, and Dutch colonial ports in the Malay Peninsula and the Indonesian Archipelago, as well as Singapore. The Peranakan Chinese are often simply referred to as the Peranakans. Peranakan culture, especially in the dominant Peranakan centres of Malacca, Singapore, Penang, Phuket, and Tangerang, is characterized by its unique hybridization of ancient Chinese culture with the local cultures of the Nusantara region, the result of a centuries-long history of transculturation and interracial marriage.

Immigrants from the southern provinces of China arrived in significant numbers in the region between the 14th and 17th centuries, taking abode in the Malay Peninsula (where their descendants in Malacca, Singapore and Penang are referred to as Baba–Nyonya); the Southern Thailand (where their descendants are referred to as Baba-Yaya), primarily in Phuket, Trang, Phang Nga, Takua Pa, and Ranong; Terengganu (where their descendants are referred to as Cheng Mua Lang) and North Borneo from the 18th century (where their descendants in Sabah are also referred to as Sino-Natives). Intermarriage between these Chinese settlers and their Malay, Thai, Javanese, or other predecessors in the region contributed to the emergence of a distinctive hybrid culture and ostensible phenotypic differences. Through colonisation of the region, the impact and presence of the Peranakan Chinese spread beyond Nusantara. In Sri Lanka, the Peranakan Chinese went on to contribute to the development of the Sri Lankan Malay identity that emerged in the nation during Dutch rule.

Beira Lake (/ˈbeɪrə/; Sinhala: බේරේ වැව, romanized: Bērē væva (IPA: [beːreː ˈʋæʋə]); Tamil: பேரே ஏரி, romanized: Pērē ēri (IPA: [peːɾeː eːɾi])) is a man-made lake in the centre of the city of Colombo in Sri Lanka. The lake is surrounded by many large businesses in the city. It initially occupied approximately 1.65 km (0.64 sq mi) of land 100 years ago but has since been reduced to 0.65 km (0.25 sq mi) today due to various reasons. During the Portuguese, Dutch and English colonial era, the lake was used for a wide variety of purposes. It still retains its Portuguese name. It is connected to many intricate canals which provided an easy way of transporting goods within the city and suburban cities.