Kannur [key], town (1991 urban agglomeration pop. 463,962), Kerala state, SE India. Formerly the capital of the Kolattiri Raja, it traded with Arabia and Persia in the 12th and 13th cent. Vasco da Gama visited Kannur in 1498, and it became a Portuguese settlement. Control passed to the Dutch in the mid-17th cent., and the British captured the town in 1783. A military station and a district administrative center, it trades in coconut products, rice, pepper, timber products, dried fish, cotton fabrics, and tobacco, and has large textile mills.
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