Vedda - Settlements



According to the Seligmanns, Bintenne Veddas lived both in permanent villages of up to 40 families and in temporary settlements, near their cultivation plots, which contained Between 1 and 5 families of varying size. The Anuradhapura Veddas occupy 32 villages and 14 satellite hamlets that are scattered among the much more numerous Sinhalese villages in the region. In 1970 their largest village had a population of 552. Their settlement pattern is similar to that of the local Sinhalese, the core of the village being a cluster of houses built close to the village reservoir. The Coast Veddas live in small villages near the sea consisting of a cluster of compounds with two or three houses to a compound. Some of the Bintenne Veddas are reported to have been cave dwellers formerly, but by the Seligmanns' time they were mostly living in huts made of wattle and daub or in more temporary shelters consisting of a wooden frame covered with animal skins, bark, and/or leaves. The Anuradhapura Veddas live in wattle-and-daub houses with floors of packed earth. Coast Vedda houses are simple huts made of plaited palm. Some Veddas have Recently received government-subsidized housing built of brick and plaster with concrete floors and tin roofs.

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