Wikijunior:Languages/Sinhalese

Wikijunior

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Languages

Arabic Bengali Catalan Dutch English Esperanto Estonian French German Hebrew Hindi Japanese Korean Latin Mandarin Chinese Marathi Nahuatl Norwegian Polish Portuguese Quenya Russian Sanskrit Serbian Spanish Swahili Tagalog Tamil Turkish Urdu

How many people speak this language?

About 15.6 million people.

Where is this language spoken?

Sri Lanka.

What is the history of this language?

It is believed that about the 5th century BC, settlers from north-eastern India reached the island of Sri Lanka. This group of settlers is referred to as prince Vijaya and his entourage in the chronicle Mahavamsa. These new settlers merged with the native Hela tribes known as Yakka, Naga who spoke Elu language, and a new nation called Sinhala came to exist.