Today let me share some interesting facts about these lesser known yet rich and beautiful languages. Before discussing about this controversial topic, let’s have a glance about what kind of these two languages are.
Most of the countries in the world usually have one official language. However, India has 22 official state languages along with Hindi and English as the national languages. Yes!! Our very own national native language is Hindi and not “Indian” which is popularly misunderstood by most of the foreigners haha.
Sanskrit (संस्कृत) is the ancient language of India, where it is believed that it was used as a medium of communication by the Hindu Celestial Gods, and then by the Indo-Aryans. No wonder why it is known as "Dev Vani" (the language of gods). Currently, Sanskrit is spoken by less than 1% of Indians and is mostly used by Hindu priests during religious ceremonies.
Coming to the Marathi language (मराठी), it belongs to the group of Indo-Aryan languages which are a part of the large of group of Indo-European languages. The script used for Marathi language is same to the Hindi language script, which is known as Devnagri script.
It is the official state language of Maharashtra and co-official state language of state of Goa. The following graph shows the percentage of native Marathi speakers in different states of India.
ORIGIN
Now as you came to know about Sanskrit and Marathi, we will now discuss its interesting relation with each other.
The origin of Sanskrit language could not be clearly defined, but it is thought to have come from the Indus valley (Pakistan) and the north-western India.
Marathi can be traced back far beyond the 10th century. It is considered that this language evolved from Sanskrit and Prakrit (group of languages spoken in ancient India). Three Prakrit languages, simpler in structure, emerged from Sanskrit. These were Saurseni, Magadhi and Maharashtri. Marathi is said to be a descendant of Maharashtri spoken by people residing in the region of Maharashtra.
As time passed, the degeneration of Sanskrit words went on this Maharashtri language which became Maharathi , and Maharathi became Marathi during 6–7 th century.
In 12–13 th century when Islam came in Maharashtra, the Arabi, Farsi and Urdu words got mixed with Marathi.
But (King) Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj took a historical decision and with the help of his literary scholars, he created a new dictionary named as Raj Vyavhar Kosh.
In this dictionary most of the Arabi, Farsi, Urdu were replaced with Sanskrit words. Because of this, many Sanskrit words again came in Marathi and it got new form which we speak today.
LITERATURE
Sanskrit literature represents a continuous cultural tradition from the Vedic period till the present. It has an extremely rich and complex grammatical structure and an enormous vocabulary. It was a spoken language for centuries before the Vedas were written down.
The composition and redaction of the two great epics, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana were in Sanskrit. Drama emerged as a distinct genre of Sanskrit literature, reaching its peak between the fourth and seventh centuries.
Famous Sanskrit dramatists include Sudraka, Bhasa, Asvaghosa and Kalidasa. Though numerous plays written by these playwrights are still available, little is known about the authors themselves.
Due to its extensive use in religious literature, primarily in Hinduism, Sanskrit language and its literature are of great importance in Indian culture, similar to the importance of Latin in European culture.
A popular song composed in Sanskrit addressing to Lord Ganesh.
The great names of early Marathi literature came with Saint Dnyaneshwar, in the 13th century. The 16th-century Saint Eknath’s best-known work is a Marathi version of the 11th book of the Bhagavata-purana. Among the devotional poets of Maharashtra, the most famous is Saint Tukaram, who wrote many devotional poems in the 16th century.
A unique contribution of Marathi literature is the tradition of Povadas, heroic stories popular among martial people. This tradition was particularly vital during the 17th century.
After 1945 Marathi poetry sought to explore human life in all its variety; it was subjective and used colloquial language. Among modern dramatists, Shripad Krushna Kolhatkar and Ram Ganesh Gadkari were notable. Realism was first brought to the stage in the 20th century by Mama Varerkar, who addressed many social issues.
Other noteworthy writers are Shripad Narayan Pendse, Kusumagraj, Gopal Nilkanth Dandekar, Ranjit Desai, and Vinda Karandikar.
A popular song composed in Marathi addressing to Lord Ganesh.
DIALECTS
Apart from standardized Marathi, Indic scholars distinguish 42 dialects of spoken Marathi. Some of the popular dialects include Malwani, Varhadi, Thanjavur Marathi, Zadiboli, Aagri, Ahirani etc.
LANGUAGE DAY
World Sanskrit Day or Sanskrit Diwas is also known as Vishvasamskritadinam. It is celebrated on Shraavana Poornima,that is on full moon day in the month of Shraavana in the Hindu calendar. It was the first time celebrated in 1969. It is celebrated to spread awareness, promote and revive the ancient India Language.
Marathi Language Day is celebrated on 27 February every year across the Indian states of Maharashtra and Goa. This day is regulated by the State Government. It is celebrated on the birthday of eminent Marathi poet Kusumagraj.
I hope that you have been now properly versed with the facts and relations of both these languages. If you have any questions, let me know in the comments…
See you next time!
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