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History of the Jews in Sri Lanka. Jews have had a presence on the island nation since at least the 9th century or even earlier. Sri Lanka was already known to Jews living in Kerala as early as the 3rd century BC. Yemeni Jewish traders used to visit Sri Lanka for trade. In the 10th century, Abu Zeid al Hasan, an Arab Muslim traveller from Siraf, Persia, stated that there were ‘a great number of Jews’ in Serendib, as Sri Lanka was known to the Arabs.
In the 12th century, Benjamin of Tudela, a Sephardi Jew who was a medieval adventurer from Navarre, Spain, reported that there were 3,000 Jews in Sri Lanka.
These early Jews in Sri Lanka either assimilated into the local population over the centuries, or, upon the arrival of the Portuguese in the early 16th century, were forced to abandon their faith and identity or slaughtered in an extension of the Portuguese Inquisition.
Neither practising Jews, nor people who preserved a knowledge of being descendants of Jews, appear to have survived from that early period, although Jewish lineages may be present. Holders of the "de Fonseka" & the "de Alwis" surname in Sri Lanka may be the mixed descendants of "" surnamed people, which is commonly associated with Sephardi Portuguese Jewish origins. The other famous known Jewish origin descendants would be the "Alkegamas". Their history could also be traced back all the way down to the Colonial times in Ceylon.
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