I l l
and all the other dialects pf the Dekhan, as Prakrits or as
dialects entirely formed on the basis of the Sanskrit, and
derived from that language with more or less of popular corruption.
It has been supposed that Dravira-desa, the
country of the Tamul speech, as well as other district#
where the Telugu and Kann&di prevail, were ancient kingdoms
of which Sanskrit was the original language, and
whence it has deviated through different culture into all the
present varieties of dialect now existing among the civilised
nations of the Peninsula.
This was the opinion, as we have seen, which Mr. Cole-
brook e appears to have adopted from Sanskrit authors;
and the same notion has been expressed even more fully by
other writers as the result of their own observation; and
inquiry. Dr. Carey, who is known to have possessed a very
extensive acquaintance with the languages of India; maintained
that “ not only the Hindustani, Bengali;~©fissa;
Mahratta, Gurjara, but likewise^; all, or nearly all, the
dialects of the SouthiB-the Telinga, Karnata, Tamil,
Malayhlam, and Singalese, are merely corrupt derivatives
from the Sanskrit.”* The same opinion seems to have been
at one time universal among Indian scholars, but it has
given way to more accurate research, and particularly to
the investigation of the subject by Mr. Mli&of'Madras.f
The writer last mentioned has fully proved that the idioms of
the Dekhan form a distinct family of languages, which boir-
row much from the Sanskrit in literary compositions, but
have in reality no essential connexion with that ancient
idiom. “ The constituent members,”“ says Mr. Ellis, “ of
the family of languages which may be appropriately called
the dialects of Southern India, are the high and low Tamil,
the Telugu, grammatical and vulgar, the Camataca or Can-
nadi, ancient and modern, the Malay&lma or Malayalam and
the Tulava, the native speech of that part of the country to
which in our maps the name of Canara is now confined.”
Besides these are a few local dialects of the same derivation,
such as the Codugu, a variety of the Tulava, spoken
* Preface to a Grammar of the Teloogoo Language by Dr. Carey.
t A Grammar of the Teloogoo Language &c., by A. D. Campbell; second
edition, 4to., Madras, 1820. Note to the Introduction, by F. W. Ellis.
in the district called by us Coorg; the Singalese, Maha-
rdstra and the Oddiya, which, though not of the same stock,
borrow many words and idioms from these tongues.”
“ The Telugu is formed from its own roots, which have no
connexion with the Sanskrit or any other language, except
the idioms of the Dekhan. To the roots of the Tamil
and Cannadi those of the Telugu are not merely similar,
but they are the same, the difference between these languages
being merely in formative affixes.”
It seems that the difference between these languages and
the Sanskrit is essential: it commences from the primitive
elements of speech. The alphabet of the Tamil is totally
different from the Nagari; it rejects all aspirates, and has
many sounds which cannot be expressed by any of the
Sanskrit letters. “ Nor is it true that the idioms of the
Dekhan are poor and defective without the addition of Sanskrit
words.” “ When all direct and indirect derivatives
from the Sanskrit and other languages are rejected, what
remains is the pure native language of the land: this constitutes
the great body of the Telugu tongue, and is capable
off expressing every mental and bodily operation, every
.possible relation and existing thing ; for with the exception
of some religious and technical terms, no word of Sanskrit
derivation is necessary to the Telugu. This pure native
language of the land, allowing for dialectic difference and
varieties of termination, Comprehends with the Telugu
the Tamil, Cannadi, and the other dialects of Southern
India.”* It must be observed that the Telugu or the Telinga
is the idiom of the ancient kingdom of Kalinga or Andhra,
on the eastern coast of the Peninsula; the Malay&l’ma
is the language of the western or Malabar coast; and the
Kannfidi that of the province of Karnataka, in the interior
or table-land of the Dekhan.-b
* Ellis’s Introduction, page 18.
V ‘r f The reader will observe a great variation in the orthography of Indian names.
I have thought it requisite when citing authorities to preserve the orthography
of the writers whom I have quoted. Thus the language of Orissa is termed
Odiya, Uriya, &c., the d and r, which are interchanged, being preferred by
different writers; Kann&df is also Canara and Karnataka; Tamul, Tamil,
Tamalah, are various ways of expressing the same name; and Telugu. is Telinga,
also Kalinga.