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EXPRESSIONS OF INDIA
Eternal India
encyclopedia
From the time of Panini onwards the language came to be called
Samskrata,
("perfected or refined") in contrast to the
Prakratas
("natural"), the popular dialects which had developed naturally.
Around the 6th century B.C., the use of classical Sanskrit began
to be restricted to a limited circle — the Brahmins who employed it
during Vedic ceremonies, the learned people and in proclamations
and official documents. In towns and villages the common people
spoke popular forms of Sanskrit called
Prakrits
which were simpler
than Sanskrit, both in sound and grammar. Several Prakrits emerged.
Shauraseni was spoken in the western part of modern Uttar Pradesh.
Ardhamagadhi was spoken in eastern Uttar Pradesh and modem
Madhya Pradesh. Magadhi in Bihar was the language used by the
Buddha. It was also the official language of the Mauryan courts and
the edicts of Ashoka were composed in it. Maharashthri was spoken
in the north-western Deccan. There were several other Prakrits of
lesser importance. Women and the humbler characters of Sanskrit
drama were made to speak in one Prakrit or other.
An important early literary Prakrit was Pali (meaning "Text or
Sacred Text") which became the language in which the canon of
Theravada Buddhism is written.
Sinhalese, the language of Ceylon (Sri Lanka), began as an Indo-
Aryan Prakrit in the second century B.C but it developed independ-
ently, influenced by the local language and Tamil, and came to bear
no resemblance to Sanskrit. Pali is still the religious language of the
Buddhists of Sri Lanka as well as those of Burma and South-East
Asia.
A later stage in the development of the Indo-Aryan languages
was
Apabhramsha
which means "falling away" (from an established
standard), the acceptance of corrupt forms (
apabhramsha
) in the
place of a standard word form. Apabhramsha, a corrupt form of
Prakrit, originated in western India. Its chief characteristic is an
increasing use of post-positions and verbal compounds as in mod-
ern Indian languages. Several new constructions in the syntax of
case and tense emerged which later on became widespread in the
modern Indo-Aryan languages.
From about 1600 A.D., works began to be composed in increas-
ingly more colloquialised
Apabhramsha
which eventually was re-
placed by various regional languages with decreasing vestiges of
Apabhramsha.
Gujarati evolved around the 10th century from Guijara
Apabhram-
sha
which was prevalent in that part of India ruled by a nomadic
tribe by the name of Gurjara. The Shauraseni, Ardhamagadhi and
Magadhi
Apabhramshas
were the sources for the development of
Hindi and its dialects - Khariboli (Delhi and.some parts of Western
U.P), Brajbhasha (Western U.P), Bundeli (M.P), Awadhi (Eastern
U.P), Maithili (Eastern Bihar), Bhojpuri (Eastern U.P. and Western
Bihar), Magadhi (Central Bihar) and Rajasthani. Khariboli, spoken
in Delhi and the surrounding areas, was recognised as the represen-
tative vernacular by the Mughal rulers. The standard Hindi approved
in the Indian Constitution as the official language of the Union is
based on the Khariboli dialect,
Bengali, Assamese, Oriya and the dialects of Bihari (Bhojpuri,
Maithili and Magadhi) evolved from the Prakrit and
Apabhramsha
spoken earlier in Magadh. The new religious sects helped in promot-
ing the growth of the vernacular languages as they wished to com-
municate with the common people in their own language. Thus
Marathi developed rapidly after it had been adopted by Mahar-
ashtrian saints and reformers like Ekanath, Tukaram and Ramdas.
Chaitanya did the same for Bengali.
The Dravidian Languages
The Dravidian languages spoken in the south, eastern and central
parts of India have remained an isolated group distinct from the
Indo-Aryan tongues of the north. Some authorities believe that they
are related to the Uralic (Hungarian, Finnish) and Altaic (Turkish,
Mongol) language groups. Another theory tries to establish a link
between the Dravidians and the peoples of the Indus Valley Civi-
lisation.
The term Dravidian was first used by Robert Caldwell in his
A
Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian or South India Family of
Languages
published in 1856. The word Dravida is a Sanskrit word
meaning Tamil and had been used in a 7th century Sanskrit text.
The major Dravidian languages are Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and
Malayalam which are the official languages of Tamil Nadu, Andhra
Pradesh, Karnataka and Kerala, respectively. A sizeable number of
people speak Tulu, a language without a script of its own which is
spoken in the coastal districts of Karnataka. Coorgi, another non-
literary language, is spoken in the mountainous Coorg district of
Karnataka and Gondi is spoken in the tribal areas of Madhya
Pradesh.
It should be surprising to know that Brahui which is spoken in
the Baluchistan province of Pakistan is a Dravidian language!
Tamil is the oldest Dravidian language and one of the oldest
spoken languages in the world. It absorbed a number of Sanskrit
words but it was less strongly influenced by Sanskrit than were
Telugu and Kannada. At the present day, under the influence of the.
Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, there is a conscious attempt to eschew
Sanskritised words and use pure Tamil in writing and speech. There
are a number of local dialects. There is a sharp difference between
the written language and the spoken form of Tamil.
Telugu is the most widely spoken of the Dravidian family. In
terms of speakers, it ranks second to Hindi among the Indian lan-
guages. Telugu was exposed to the influence of Sanskrit and the
Prakrit as early as the 3rd century B.C. The first Telugu inscription
belongs to about 575 A.D. The Telugu script is akin to Kannada
being different in only six letters. It has a number of local dialects.
The oldest form of Kannada available is documented in the
Halmidi inscription of 450 A.D. This is a record put up by the
Kadambas whom historians consider to be the first Kannada kings
to rule Karnataka. Kannada separated itself from the southern branch
of the Dravidian language family much earlier and developed into
a separate language. According to an eminent scholar, T.N. Sreekan-
tayya "it is not known when exactly Tamil and Kannada separated
from each other and became distinct languages; but the middle of
the first millennium B.C. may not be wide of the mark."
Kannada was influenced by Sanskrit and Prakrit because of the
dominant position accorded to these languages by the dynasties that
ruled Karnataka. Indeed the development of Kannada was impeded
because of this. During the reign of the Satavahanas who ruled
Karnataka in the early century of the Christian era Prakrit was the
official language. Poets and Kings composed their works in Sanskrit
or Prakrit. Prakrit was also the official language during the Kadamba