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(Redirected from Marathi)
'Marathi' (मराठी '') is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Marathi people of western India (Maharashtrians). It is the official language of the state of Maharashtra. There are roughly 90 million fluent speakers worldwide. Marathi is the 4th most spoken language in India[3] and 15th most spoken language in world1. Along with Bengali, Marathi is the oldest of the regional literatures in Indo-Aryan languages, dating from about AD 1000.[4]
Marathi is at least 1500 years old, and its grammar and syntax derive from Pali and Prakrit. In ancient times, Marathi was called ''Maharashtri'', ''Marhatti'', ''Mahratti'' etc.
Peculiar features of Marathi linguistic culture include Marathi drama, with its unique flavour of 'Sangeet Natak' (musical dramas), scholarly discourses called 'Vasant Vyakhyanmala' (''Lectures in Spring''), Marathi folk dance called 'Lavani', and special editions of magazines for Diwali called 'Diwali anka'.
Marathi is primarily spoken in Maharashtra and, parts of neighboring states of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Goa, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, union-territories of Daman-diu and Dadra Nagar Haveli. The cities of Baroda, Ahmedabad (Gujarat) Belgaum, Hubli, Dharwad and Bidar (Karnataka) Indore,Gwalior (Madhya Pradesh), Hyderabad (Andhra Pradesh) and Tanjore (Tamil Nadu) each have sizable Marathi-speaking communities. Marathi is also spoken by Maharashtrian émigrés in North America and Europe. The Ethnologue states that Marathi is even spoken in Israel and Mauritius.
Marathi is an official language of Indian state of Maharashtra, co-official language or used for official purposes in Goa, union territory of Daman and Diu and Dadra Nagar haveli. The Constitution of India recognizes Marathi as one of India's 22 official languages.
In addition to all universities in Maharashtra, University of Baroda (Gujarat), Osmania University (Andhra Pradesh) [5], Gulbarga university (Karnataka) and Panaji university (Goa) all have special departments for higher studies in Marathi linguistics.
'' Main article: 'Marathi literature'''.
Marathi literarature has been written since the 13th century, although the language can be traced back far before the 10th century. It descends from Sanskrit through Pali, Maharashtri and Maharashtra - Apabhramsa. Maharashtri Prakrit was most popular amongst Prakrit languages and widely spoken in western and southern India. Today's Marathi and Kannada speaking parts were speaking Maharashtri from centuries.[6] A gradual process of change and modification in the spoken language has led to the rise of the present Marathi. [7]
; Earliest forms
:Scholars disagree about the origin and antiquity of Marathi. The earliest known written form is on the copper plate of Vijayaditya found in Satara, dated 739. The stone inscription at the feet of Shravanabelgola Gomateshwar, whose first line reads as "Chavundarajen Karaviyalen" (श्रीचावुण्डराजे करवियले, श्रीगंगराजे सुत्ताले करवियले, meaning ''Built by Chavundaraja, the son of Gangaraja''), is another old specimen, constructed in 983. Also, an interesting couplet is found in the Jain monk Udyotan Suri's 'Kuvalayamala' in the 8th century, referring to a bazaar where the Marhattes speak ''Dinnale'' (''Dile'' - given), ''Gahille'' (''Ghetale'' - taken). The Marathi translation of ''Panchatantra'' is also considered very old.[8]
;Satvahanas (Pratishthan)
: Marathi developed from Maharashtri Prakrit, the official language of the Satavahana empire during its early periods. With the patronage of the Satavahana empire based at Pratishthana (now Paithan), Maharashtri became the most widespread Prakrit language of its time, and dominated the other two Dramatic Prakrits, Sauraseni and Magadhi. A version of Maharashtri, Jaina Maharashtri, was used in sections of the Jain canon. The most famous literature in Maharashtri is the Gathasattasai or Gathasaptashathi, an anthology of poems collected by the Satavahana Emperor Hala (150 BC). (See reference publications).
;Yadava (Devgiri)
:Marathi literature began and grew thanks to the rise of the Yadava dynasty of Devgiri, who adopted Marathi as the court language and patronized Marathi learned men, and the rise of two religious sects - Mahanubhav Panth and Warkari Panth7.
:Maharashtri slowly evolved into Marathi over the course of 13th to 16th century. Several saint-poets added to Marathi literature during this time. Notable examples of Marathi prose are "Līḷācarītra" (लीळाचरीत्र), events and anecdotes from miracle filled life of Chakradhar Swami of the Mahanubhav Sect compiled by his close disciples. It is the oldest biography and probably the oldest book in prose form in Marathi), Vivekasindhu( विवेकसिंधु ) by Mukundaraj. One of the famous saints of this period is Sant (saint in Marathi) Dnyaneshwar (1275-1296) who wrote Bhawarthadeepika, popularly known as Dnyaneshwari[9]. Mahanubhav panth and Warkari panth adopted Marathi as the medium for preaching their doctrines of devotion.
;Warkari sect
:They were followed by the Warkari saint-poet Eknath ((1528-1599). Mukteswar translated the great epic Mahabharata into Marathi. Social reformers like saint-poet Tukaram transformed Marathi into a rich literary language. A real genius, Tukaram’s poetry contained his wonderful inspirations. He was a radical reformer. Conciseness, clarity, vigor and earnestness were the peculiarities of his poetry7. Writers of the Mahanubhav sect contributed to Marathi prose while the saint-poets of Warkari sect composed Marathi poetry. However, the latter group is regarded as the pioneers and founders of Marathi literature.
;Maratha period
:Since 1630, Marathi regained prominence with the rise of the loose-knit Maratha empire beginning with the reign of Chhatrapati Shivaji (1630 – 1680). Subsequent rulers extended the empire northwards to Delhi, eastwards to Orissa, and southwards to Thanjavur in Tamil Nadu. These excursions by the Marathas helped the spread of Marathi over broader geographical regions. This period also saw the use of Marathi in transactions involving land and other business. Documents from this period therefore, give a better picture of life of common people (who spoke the language) than the documents in Farsi which was used previously but understood only by the elites of the islamic rulers.. At the time, Samartha (''The Able One'') Ramdas (1608-1681) made important contributions to Marathi poetic literature. But by the late 18th century, the Maratha Empire's influence on a large part of the country was on the decline.
;18th century
:In the 18th century, some well-known works like Yatharthadeepika by Vaman Pandit, Naladamayanti Swayamvara by Raghunath Pandit, Pandava Pratap, Harivijay, Ramvijay by Shridhar Pandit and Mahabharata by Moropanta were produced.
;Modern period (after 1800)
This British colonial period saw standardization of Marathi grammar through efforts of Christian missionary, William Carey.
:Late 19th century in Maharashtra was a period of colonial modernity. Like the corresponding periods in other Indian languages, this was the period dominated by English-educated intellectuals. It was the age of prose and reason. It was the period of reformist didacticism and a great intellectual ferment.
:The first Marathi translation of an English book was published in 1817, and the first Marathi newspaper was started in 1835. Newspapers provided a platform for sharing literary views, and many books on social reforms were written. The Marathi language flourished as Marathi drama gained popularity. Musicals known as 'Sangit Natak' also evolved.
The first half of 20th century was marked by new enthusiasm in literary pursuits, and socio-political activism helped achieve major milestones in Marathi literature, drama, music and film.
After the Indian independence, Marathi was accorded the status of a scheduled language on the national level.
By May 1, 1960, Maharashtra State emerged re-organised on linguistic lines adding Vidarbha and Marathwada region in its fold and bringing major chunks of Marathi population socio-politically together. With state and cultural protection, Marathi made great strides by the 1990s.
A literary event called ''Akhil Bharatiya Marathi Sahitya Sammelan'' (All-India Marathi Literature Meet) is held every year. In addition, the ''Akhil Bharatiya Marathi Natya Sammelan'' (All-India Marathi Theatre Meet) is also held annually. Both events are very popular amongst Maharashtrians.
But, while literature is still being written, the importance of English has been underscored by Indian strides after 1990 in the global IT market, rapid techno-educational growth and widening economic opportunities. Therefore, the Government of Maharashtra decided that English should be taught as a second language from the first standard (first grade) in schools where the medium of teaching was Marathi. This decision has been controversial and has caused many Marathi people to worry about the fate of their language, a concern which is compounded by the Marathi middle class's increasing preference for English-medium schools. Increasing use of Hindi in urban Maharashtra has also saddened Marathi people and linguists. Recently Government of Maharashtra made Marathi language compulsory in CBSE/ICSE boards are controlled by Central government. Marathi is already a compulsory subject in Maharashtra state board.[10]
At the same time, the spread of spoken Marathi has increased beyond its regular boundaries due to the increase of its élite, well-educated global Maharashtrian diaspora. Several Marathi mandals have flourished (especially in United states, Europe and Gulf countries) for meetings and cultural events by them.
Standard Marathi is based on dialects used by academicians and the print media, and is influenced by educated élite of the Pune region. Maharashtra Sahitya Parishad (MSP) is apex guiding body for literary institutions of Marathi language. From time to time, MSP helps out in discourses over various aspects of Marathi and in laying down precedents by framing rules, whenever required.
Historically, the major dialect divisions have been Ahirani, Khandeshi, Varhadi, Konkani, Wadvali and Samavedi.
Ahirani is spoken in the west Khandesh North Maharashtara region.
Ahirani is a language today spoken in the Jalgaon, Nandurbar, Dhule and Nashik (Baglan, Malegaon and Kalwan tehsils) districts of Maharashtra, India. It is further divided into dialects, such as Chalisgaon, Malegaon and Dhule group. Amalner is considered the cultural capital of Khandesh as Amalner has witnessed Akhil Bhartiya Marathi Sahitya Sammelan.
Adapting & bending the words from Hindi and Gujarati, Ahirani has created its own words which are never found in these languages. Ahirani is a colloquial form and uses the Devnagari script for its writing. Though it is the written form of devnagari but it is very difficult to write rather than to speak.
Khandeshi is spoken in East Khandesh specifically in Yawal and Raver Talukas. Khandeshi is also called as Tawadi which is specifically spoken by Leva Patils dominant cast of east Khandesh.
Bahinabai Chaudhari is well known poet in Khandeshi, the study of her literature is studied and included in Marathi language. It is often misquoted that Bahinabai is an ahirani poet.
Varhādi or Vaidarbhi is spoken in the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra.
In Marathi, the retroflex lateral approximant '' () is common, while in the Varhadii dialect, it corresponds to the palatal approximant ''y'' (IPA: [j]), making this dialect quite distinct. Such phonetic shifts are common in spoken Marathi, and as such, the spoken dialects vary from one region of Maharashtra to another.
The constitution of India considers Konkani as one of the 22 scheduled (official) languages[11]. In Maharashtra and institutions like Gomantak Marathi Academy, consider Konkani as a dialect of Marathi.[12] Konkani in Maharashtra-Goa is sub-divided into several sub-dialects. Warli, Kankon Konkani, Mālvani (spoken in southern Konkan near Malvan), Dangi are some of them. Marathis and Konkanis in Goa have had bitter fights over the official language issue.[13] Most Konkani people in Maharashtra speak and write fluent Marathi. [14]
This dialect may not be named thus though, but was primarily spoken by Wadvals, which essentially means agricultural plot owners, of the Naigaon, Vasai region. This language is preserved by Roman Catholics native to this region; it is also spoken by the Hindus, but due to external influence, ordinary Marathi is now more popular among them.
Samvedi is spoken in the interiors of Nala Sopara and Virar region to the north of Mumbai in the Vasai Taluka, Thane District of Maharashtra. The name of this language correctly suggests that its origins lie with the Samavedi Brahmins native to this region. Again this language too finds more speakers among the Roman Catholic converts native to this region (who are known as East Indians). This dialect is very different from the other Marathi dialects spoken in other regions of Maharashtra, but resembles Wadvali very closely. Both Wadvali and Samavedi have relatively higher proportion of words imported from Portuguese as compared to ordinary Marathi, because of direct influence of the Portuguese who colonized this region till 1739.
Thanjavur Marathi, Namdev Marathi and Bhavsar Marathi are spoken by many Southern Indians. This dialect evolved from the time of occupation of the Marathas in Thanjavur in southern Tamil Nadu. It has speakers in parts of Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka.
★ 'Dangii' (spoken near the Maharashtra-Gujarat border)
★ 'Judæo-Marathi' (spoken by the Bene Israel Jews)
★ 'Kadodii' (spoken near Vasai)
Other dialects of Marathi include Karwari(a sub-dialect of Konkani spoken in Karwar, Mangalore and nearby areas of South Kanara), Chitpavani(original dialect spoken by Konkanastha Brahmins but most speak standard Marathi), Kudaalee(dialect spokan in Kudal Taluka of Ratnagiri District), Kunabi of Mahad, Cochin Konkani(spoken in west coast of Kerala), Konkani of Kasargod, Warli of Thane District, Gawdi of Goa(spoken by Gawdi tribes in Goa), Dakshini (Marathwada), Deshi (Eastern Konkan Ghats).
★ Dakhini and Hyderabadi Urdu spoken in Hyderabad and some parts of Deccan are considerably influenced by Marathi. The grammar of ''Hyderabadi Urdu'' is adapted from Marathi. In fact, it is also called a creole between Marathi and Urdu with some Telugu words.
★ Kannada: especially the northern Karnataka Kannada has been heavily influenced by Marathi. E.g. the feature of aspiration, quite non-native to any Dravidian language, is found in northern Kannada. Also some kinship terms like ''vahini'' (brother's wife) are adapted from Marathi.
The phoneme inventory of Marathi is similar to that of many other Indo-Āryan languages. An IPA chart of all contrastive sounds in Marathi is provided below.
''See Devanagari script'' & ''Modi script''
Marathi is written in the Devanagari script, an alphasyllabary or abugida consisting of 16 vowel letters and 36 consonant letters making a total of 52 letters. It is written from left to right.
Like other alphasyllabaries, Devanagari writes out syllables by adding vowel diacritics to consonant bases. The table below includes all the vowel symbols used in Marathi, along with a transliteration of each sound into the Roman alphabet and IPA.
There are two more vowels in Marathi to denote the pronunciations of English words such as of 'a' in act and 'a' in all. These are written as 'अँ' and 'आँ'. The IPA signs for these are and , respectively.
Marathi retains several features of Sanskrit that have been lost in north-Indian Sanskrit-based languages such as Hindi and Bengali, especially in terms of pronunciation of vowels and consonants. For instance, Marathi retains the original Sanskrit pronunciation of अं , ऐ , and औ . However, as was done in Gujarati, Marathi speakers tend to pronounce ऋ somewhat similar to , unlike most other Indic languages which changed it to (e.g. the original Sanskrit pronunciation of the language's name was '', while in day-to-day Marathi and Gujarati it is ''. In other Indic languages it is closer to ''). Also, the Marathi pronunciation of ज्ञ (''jña'') very closely resembles Sanskrit pronunciation, compared to ''gya'' in Hindi. Interestingly, spoken Marathi allows for original Sanskrit pronunciations of words like राम (''rama'') with an emphasis on the ending vowel sound, a feature that has been lost in Hindi.
The table below includes all the consonant bases onto which vowel diacritics are placed. The lack of a vowel diacritic can either indicate the lack of a vowel, or the existence of the default, or "inherent", vowel, which in the case of Marathi is the schwa.
A defining feature of the Marathi language is the frequent substitution of the consonant ल (la) in Sanskrit words with the retroflex lateral approximant ळ (ḷa). For instance, कुळ (''kuḷa'') for the Sanskrit कुलम् (''kulam'' or clan) and कमळ (''kamaḷ'') for Sanskrit कमलम् (''kamalam'' or lotus). Such Marathi words become tongue-twisters for native speakers of North Indian languages such as Hindi and Bengali in which ळ is absent. Moreover, the unique pronunciations of the consonants च and झ in Marathi make it a difficult language to learn even for speakers of other Sanskrit-based languages like Gujarati and Hindi.
The combination of the vowels with the k-series
When two or more consecutive consonants are followed by a vowel then a ''jodakshar'' (consonant cluster) is formed. Some examples of consonant clusters are shown below:
★ 'त्या'चे - ''tyāce''
★ 'प्रस्ता'व - ''prastāv''
★ वि'द्या' - ''vidyā''
★ 'म्या'न - ''myān''
★ 'त्व'रा - ''tvarā''
★ मह'त्त्व' - ''mahattva''
★ फ'क्त' - ''phakt''
★ बाहु'ल्या' - ''bāhulyā''
Marathi has a few consonant clusters that are rarely seen in the world's languages, including the so-called "nasal aspirates" (, nh, and mh) and liquid aspirates (rh, ṟh, lh, and vh). Some examples are given below.
★ क'ण्हे'री - - "a shrub known for flowers"
★ 'न्हा'णे - - "bath"
★ 'म्ह'णून - - "because"
★ त'ऱ्हा' - ''taṟhā'' - "different way of behaving"
★ को'ल्हा' - ''kolhā'' - "fox"
★ कें'व्हा' - ''keṃvhā'' "when"
Marathi was written in Modi script-- a cursive script designed for minimising the lifting of pen from paper while writing[15]. Most writings of Maratha empire are in Modi script. However, Persian-based scripts were also used for court documentation. With the advent of large-scale printing, Modi script fell into disuse, as it proved very difficult for type-setting. Currently due to availability of Modi fonts and the enthusiasm of the young generation the script is far from being vanished. (See Reference Links).
Marathi grammar shares similarities with other modern Indo-Aryan languages such as Hindi, Gujarati, Punjabi, etc. The first modern book exclusively on Marathi Grammar was printed in 1805 by 'William Kerry'.[16] Sanskrit Grammar used to be referred more till late stages of Marathi Language.(Citation Needed)
The contemporary grammatical rules described by Maharashtra Sahitya Parishad and endorsed by the Government of Maharashtra are supposed to take precedence in standard written Marathi. These rules are described in ''Marathi Grammar'', written by M.R Walimbe. The book is widely referred to in schools and colleges.
Traditions of Marathi Linguistics and above mentioned rules give special status to 'Tatsam' (Without Change) words adapted from the Sanskrit language. This special status expects the rules for 'Tatsam' words be followed as of Sanskrit grammar. While this supports Marathi Language with a larger treasure of Sanskrit words to cope up with demands of new technical words whenever needed; maintains influence over Marathi.
An unusual feature of Marathi, as compared to other Indo-European languages, is that it displays the inclusive and exclusive we feature, that is common to the Dravidian languages, Rajasthani, and Gujarati.
Unlike its related languages, Marathi preserves all three grammatical genders (''Linga'') from Sanskrit.
★ masculine — पुल्लिंग (''pulliṃga'')
★ feminine — स्त्रीलिंग (''strīliṃga'')
★ neuter — नपुंसकलिंग (''naṃpusakliṃga'')
Masculine proper nouns usually end in the short vowels ''a'' or ''u'' while feminine proper nouns tend to end with the long vowels ''ā'', ''ī'' or ''ū''.
There are three grammatical voices (''Prayog'') in Marathi.
★ 'Kartarii prayog' refers to a sentence construction in which the verb changes according to the subject, which is comparable to the active voice in English.
:''Raam mhanato'' "Raam says", ''Raam aambaa khaato'' "Raam eats a mango"
★ 'Karmanii prayog' refers to a sentence construction in which the verb changes according to the object, which is like the passive voice in English.
:''Raamaane aambaa khallaa'' "The mango was eaten by Raam", ''Raamaane saangitale'' "It was told by Ram"
★ 'Bhaave prayog' refers to a sentence construction in which the verb does not change according to either the subject or the object. This is used for imperatives.
:''Maajha nirop tyaala jaaun saang'' "Give my message to him"
There are three grammatical persons (''Purushh'') in Marathi.
★ 'Pratham purushh' (First person)
★
★ ''mi'' "I"
★
★ ''aamhi'' "we" excluding the listener (exclusive "we")
★
★ ''aapan'' "we" including the listener (inclusive "we")
★ 'Dwitiya purushh' (Second person)
★
★ ''tuu'' "you"
★
★ ''tumhi'' "you" (plural or formal)
★
★ ''aapan'' (extremely formal)
★ 'Trutiya purushh' (Third person)
★
★ ''to'' "he"
★
★ ''tii'' "she"
★
★ ''te'' "it"
★
★ ''te'' "they" (masculine) or "he" (formal)
★
★ ''tyaa'' "they" (feminine)
★
★ ''tii'' "they" (neuter)
Marathi words can be classified in any of the following parts:
# 'naama' (noun)
# 'visheshanaama' (proper noun)
# 'sarvanaam' (pronoun)
# 'visheshaNa' (adjective)
# 'kriyaavisheshaNa' (adverb)
# 'kriyapada' (verb)
# 'avyaya' (indeclinables or uninflected word)
#
★ 'ubhayanvayi avyaya'
#
★ 'shabdayogi avyaya'
#
★ 'kevalaprayogi avyaya'
The usual word order in a sentence is Subject Object Verb (SOV); however, because of the extensive declension and conjugation patterns, order can be changed for stess purposes without a loss in meaning (unlike English).
Marathi is a highly inflected language, like the other ancient Indo-Europeanlanguages such as its own mother Sanskrit. While English uses prepositions, in Marathi, such functions are indicated through the use of case-suffixes. These are referred to as ''vibhaktii pratyay''. There are eight such ''vibhaktii'' in Marathi. The form of the original word changes when such a suffix is to be attached to the word, and the new, modified root is referred to as ''saamaanya ruup'' of the original word. For example, the word ("horse") gets transformed into when the suffix ''-var'' ("on") is attached to it to form ("on the horse").
Many government and semi-government organisations exist which work for regulation, promotion and enrichment of Marathi language. These are either initiated or funded by Government of Maharashtra. Few prominent Marathi organisations are given below:
★ Rajya Marathi Vikas Sanstha
★ Maharashtra Sahitya Parishad, Pune
★ Marathi Vishwakosh (encyclopedia) project
★ Akhil Bharatiya Marathi Sahitya Mahamandal
★ Vidarbha Sahitya Sangh
★ Marathwada Sahitya Parishad
★ Mumbai Marathi Sahitya Sangh
★ Gomantak Marathi academy
Over a period of many centuries Marathi language and people came in touch with many other languages and dialects. The primary influence of Prakrit, Maharashtri, Apbhramsha and Sanskrit is understandable.
While Marathi has shared both directions, vocabulary and grammar with languages like Indian Dravidian languages, and a few foreign languages like Persian, Arabic, English and a little from Portuguese.
While recent genome studies suggest some amount of political and trade relations between the Indian subcontinent and East Africa, Middle East, Central Asia over a millennium, these studies are still not conclusive about exact effect on linguistcs.
★ Usage of punctuation marks was one of the major contributions to Indic script by foreign languages. Previously, due to Sanskritised poetry, texts punctuation requirements of many texts may have been less.
Marathi has taken and given words from/to Sanskrit, Kannada, Hindi, Urdu, Arabic, Persian, and Portuguese.
★ ''Adakitta'' "nutcracker" directly borrowed from ''Kannada''
★ ''Khurchii'' "chair" is derived from Arabic ''kursi''
★ ''Jaahiraat'' "advertisement" is derived from Persian ''zaahiraat'' See Note 1
★ ''Shiphaaras'' "recommendation" is derived from Persian sifarish
★ ''Marjii'' "wish" is derived from Persian "marzi"
★ ''Batataa'' "potato", is derived from Portuguese
★ ''Ananas'' "pineapple", is derived from Portuguese See Note 2
★ ''Niga'' "looking after" is derived from Persian ''nîgâh'' "sight-vision"
★ ''Hajeri'' Attendance from ''Hajiri'' Urdu
A lot of English words are commonly used in conversation, and are considered to be totally assimilated into the Marathi vocabulary. These include "pen" (native Marathi ), "shirt" (''sadaraa'').
Many Marathi words are very close to English. It is interesting to have a look at its similarity.
★ ''Navy'' compared to ''Nau''
★ ''Dew'' compared to ''Dav''
★ ''Tree'' compared to ''Taru''
Marathi uses many morphological processes to join words together, forming complex words. These processes are traditionally referred to as ''sandhi'' (from Sanskrit, "combination"). For example, ''ati'' + ''uttam'' gives the word ''atyuttam''.
Another method of combining words is referred to as ''samaas'' (from Sanskrit, "margin"). There are no reliable rules to follow to make a ''samaas''. When the second word starts with a consonant, a ''sandhi'' can not be formed, but a ''samaas'' can be formed. For example, ''miith-bhaakar'' ("salt-bread"), ''udyog-patii'' ("businessman"), ("eight-hands", name of a Hindu goddess), and so on. There are different names given to each type of ''samaas''.
Like many other languages, Marathi uses distinct names for the numbers 1 to 20 and each multiple of 10, and composite ones for those greater than 20.
As with other Indic languages, there are distinct names for the fractions ¼, ½, and ¾. They are ''paava'', ''ardhaa'', and respectively. For most fractions greater than 1, the prefixes ''savvaa-'', , are used. There are special names for 1.5 and 2.5 .
The powers of ten are as follows:
★ 100: ''shambhar'' (also constructed with number prefix and "-she" suffix)
★ 1,000: ''hazaar'' (or ''sahasra'', a word close to the Sanskrit version)
★ 100,000: ''laakh'' (or ''laksha'')
★ 10,000,000: ''koti''
★ 1,000,000,000: ''abja''
★ 10,000,000,000: ''kharva''
★ 100,000,000,000: ''nikharva''
★ 100,000,000,000,000,000: ''parardha''
A positive integer is read by breaking it up from the tens digit leftwards, into parts each containing two digits, the only exception being the hundreds place containing only one digit instead of two. For example, 1,234,567 is read as ''12 laakh 34 hazaar 5 she 67''.
Marathi was weak on computers and internet like other Indian languages. But of late, with the introduction of language localisation projects and new technologies, various software and internet applications have been introduced. Shrilipi, Shivaji, Kiran fonts were used prior to introduction of Unicode standard for Devanagari script. Various Marathi typing software (Baraha is most used) and display interface packages are now available on both Windows and Linux. Many Marathi websites including prominent Marathi newspapers have became popular epecially with Maharashtrians outside India. Online projects like Marathi wikipedia, Marathi blogroll and Marathi blogs are gaining popularity. See more notable websites in #External links section.
★ Wikipedia in Marathi
★ Maharashtra
★ Marathi people
★ Marathi literature
★ Modi script, Devanagari
★
★ Languages of India
★ List of national languages of India
★ List of Indian languages by total speakers
1. Languages Spoken by More Than 10 Million People
2. Top 30 languages of the world
3. Languages in Descending Order of Strength in India : 1991 Census
4. arts, South Asian." Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica 2007 Ultimate Reference Suite.
5. Higher studies in Marathi linguistics
6. History of medieval Hindu India
(BEING A history of Indian from 600 to 1200 AD) Vol I pg.317 by C.V.Vaidya
7. Indiasite's page on Marathi language
8. Marathyancha Itihaas by Dr.Kolarkar (pg.3)
9. Dnyaneshwari
10. Marathi to be compulsory in CBSE, ICSE curricula schools
11. Official languages of India
12. Goa Marathi Academy
13. Marathi vs Konkani debate continues in Goa
14. "Aapalaa Maharashtra: Parampara va Pragati" (Our Maharashtra: Traditions and Progress) (1985) - A Government of Maharashtra publication.
15. Modi lipi
16. Maharashtra times article
★ Marathi: The Language and its Linguistic Traditions - Prabhakar Machwe, Indian and Foreign Review, 15 March 1985.
★ 'Atyavashyak Marathi Vyakaran' (''Essential Marathi Grammar'') - Dr. V. L. Vardhe
★ 'Marathi Vyakaran' (''Marathi Grammar'') - Moreshvar Sakharam More.
★ 'Marathi Vishwakosh, Khand 12 (''Marathi World Encyclopedia, Volume 12''), Page 1197 - Maharashtra Rajya Vishwakosh Nirmiti Mandal, Mumbai
'Marathi and Internet'
★ Marathi Wikipedia
★ Marathi blogs (Blogroll)
★ Manogat-chat forum
''Portals''
★ Marathiworld
★ Maayboli
'Marathi Dictionary'
★ Shabdabandha an online Marathi-Marathi dictionary
★ Marathi-English (J.T.Molesworth)
★ Marathi-English (Aryabhusan)
'Marathi newspapers'
★ Esakal
★ Maharashtra Times
★ Loksatta
★ Lokmat
'Marathi Miscellaneous'
★ Marathi: history and reference
★ Ethnologue report for Marathi
★ Marathi documents
'Learn Marathi'
★ Learn to speak Marathi
★ Marathi phrases in English
'Marathi' (मराठी '') is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Marathi people of western India (Maharashtrians). It is the official language of the state of Maharashtra. There are roughly 90 million fluent speakers worldwide. Marathi is the 4th most spoken language in India[3] and 15th most spoken language in world1. Along with Bengali, Marathi is the oldest of the regional literatures in Indo-Aryan languages, dating from about AD 1000.[4]
Marathi is at least 1500 years old, and its grammar and syntax derive from Pali and Prakrit. In ancient times, Marathi was called ''Maharashtri'', ''Marhatti'', ''Mahratti'' etc.
Peculiar features of Marathi linguistic culture include Marathi drama, with its unique flavour of 'Sangeet Natak' (musical dramas), scholarly discourses called 'Vasant Vyakhyanmala' (''Lectures in Spring''), Marathi folk dance called 'Lavani', and special editions of magazines for Diwali called 'Diwali anka'.
Geographic distribution
Marathi is primarily spoken in Maharashtra and, parts of neighboring states of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Goa, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, union-territories of Daman-diu and Dadra Nagar Haveli. The cities of Baroda, Ahmedabad (Gujarat) Belgaum, Hubli, Dharwad and Bidar (Karnataka) Indore,Gwalior (Madhya Pradesh), Hyderabad (Andhra Pradesh) and Tanjore (Tamil Nadu) each have sizable Marathi-speaking communities. Marathi is also spoken by Maharashtrian émigrés in North America and Europe. The Ethnologue states that Marathi is even spoken in Israel and Mauritius.
Official status
Marathi is an official language of Indian state of Maharashtra, co-official language or used for official purposes in Goa, union territory of Daman and Diu and Dadra Nagar haveli. The Constitution of India recognizes Marathi as one of India's 22 official languages.
In addition to all universities in Maharashtra, University of Baroda (Gujarat), Osmania University (Andhra Pradesh) [5], Gulbarga university (Karnataka) and Panaji university (Goa) all have special departments for higher studies in Marathi linguistics.
History
Oldest Marathi inscription (983 CE) at the base of Gomateshwar monolith in Shravanabelagola, Karnataka
'' Main article: 'Marathi literature'''.
Marathi literarature has been written since the 13th century, although the language can be traced back far before the 10th century. It descends from Sanskrit through Pali, Maharashtri and Maharashtra - Apabhramsa. Maharashtri Prakrit was most popular amongst Prakrit languages and widely spoken in western and southern India. Today's Marathi and Kannada speaking parts were speaking Maharashtri from centuries.[6] A gradual process of change and modification in the spoken language has led to the rise of the present Marathi. [7]
Pre-13th century
; Earliest forms
:Scholars disagree about the origin and antiquity of Marathi. The earliest known written form is on the copper plate of Vijayaditya found in Satara, dated 739. The stone inscription at the feet of Shravanabelgola Gomateshwar, whose first line reads as "Chavundarajen Karaviyalen" (श्रीचावुण्डराजे करवियले, श्रीगंगराजे सुत्ताले करवियले, meaning ''Built by Chavundaraja, the son of Gangaraja''), is another old specimen, constructed in 983. Also, an interesting couplet is found in the Jain monk Udyotan Suri's 'Kuvalayamala' in the 8th century, referring to a bazaar where the Marhattes speak ''Dinnale'' (''Dile'' - given), ''Gahille'' (''Ghetale'' - taken). The Marathi translation of ''Panchatantra'' is also considered very old.[8]
;Satvahanas (Pratishthan)
: Marathi developed from Maharashtri Prakrit, the official language of the Satavahana empire during its early periods. With the patronage of the Satavahana empire based at Pratishthana (now Paithan), Maharashtri became the most widespread Prakrit language of its time, and dominated the other two Dramatic Prakrits, Sauraseni and Magadhi. A version of Maharashtri, Jaina Maharashtri, was used in sections of the Jain canon. The most famous literature in Maharashtri is the Gathasattasai or Gathasaptashathi, an anthology of poems collected by the Satavahana Emperor Hala (150 BC). (See reference publications).
13th century to 1905
;Yadava (Devgiri)
:Marathi literature began and grew thanks to the rise of the Yadava dynasty of Devgiri, who adopted Marathi as the court language and patronized Marathi learned men, and the rise of two religious sects - Mahanubhav Panth and Warkari Panth7.
:Maharashtri slowly evolved into Marathi over the course of 13th to 16th century. Several saint-poets added to Marathi literature during this time. Notable examples of Marathi prose are "Līḷācarītra" (लीळाचरीत्र), events and anecdotes from miracle filled life of Chakradhar Swami of the Mahanubhav Sect compiled by his close disciples. It is the oldest biography and probably the oldest book in prose form in Marathi), Vivekasindhu( विवेकसिंधु ) by Mukundaraj. One of the famous saints of this period is Sant (saint in Marathi) Dnyaneshwar (1275-1296) who wrote Bhawarthadeepika, popularly known as Dnyaneshwari[9]. Mahanubhav panth and Warkari panth adopted Marathi as the medium for preaching their doctrines of devotion.
;Warkari sect
:They were followed by the Warkari saint-poet Eknath ((1528-1599). Mukteswar translated the great epic Mahabharata into Marathi. Social reformers like saint-poet Tukaram transformed Marathi into a rich literary language. A real genius, Tukaram’s poetry contained his wonderful inspirations. He was a radical reformer. Conciseness, clarity, vigor and earnestness were the peculiarities of his poetry7. Writers of the Mahanubhav sect contributed to Marathi prose while the saint-poets of Warkari sect composed Marathi poetry. However, the latter group is regarded as the pioneers and founders of Marathi literature.
;Maratha period
:Since 1630, Marathi regained prominence with the rise of the loose-knit Maratha empire beginning with the reign of Chhatrapati Shivaji (1630 – 1680). Subsequent rulers extended the empire northwards to Delhi, eastwards to Orissa, and southwards to Thanjavur in Tamil Nadu. These excursions by the Marathas helped the spread of Marathi over broader geographical regions. This period also saw the use of Marathi in transactions involving land and other business. Documents from this period therefore, give a better picture of life of common people (who spoke the language) than the documents in Farsi which was used previously but understood only by the elites of the islamic rulers.. At the time, Samartha (''The Able One'') Ramdas (1608-1681) made important contributions to Marathi poetic literature. But by the late 18th century, the Maratha Empire's influence on a large part of the country was on the decline.
;18th century
:In the 18th century, some well-known works like Yatharthadeepika by Vaman Pandit, Naladamayanti Swayamvara by Raghunath Pandit, Pandava Pratap, Harivijay, Ramvijay by Shridhar Pandit and Mahabharata by Moropanta were produced.
;Modern period (after 1800)
This British colonial period saw standardization of Marathi grammar through efforts of Christian missionary, William Carey.
:Late 19th century in Maharashtra was a period of colonial modernity. Like the corresponding periods in other Indian languages, this was the period dominated by English-educated intellectuals. It was the age of prose and reason. It was the period of reformist didacticism and a great intellectual ferment.
:The first Marathi translation of an English book was published in 1817, and the first Marathi newspaper was started in 1835. Newspapers provided a platform for sharing literary views, and many books on social reforms were written. The Marathi language flourished as Marathi drama gained popularity. Musicals known as 'Sangit Natak' also evolved.
20th century to present
A few popular Marathi newspapers
The first half of 20th century was marked by new enthusiasm in literary pursuits, and socio-political activism helped achieve major milestones in Marathi literature, drama, music and film.
After the Indian independence, Marathi was accorded the status of a scheduled language on the national level.
By May 1, 1960, Maharashtra State emerged re-organised on linguistic lines adding Vidarbha and Marathwada region in its fold and bringing major chunks of Marathi population socio-politically together. With state and cultural protection, Marathi made great strides by the 1990s.
A literary event called ''Akhil Bharatiya Marathi Sahitya Sammelan'' (All-India Marathi Literature Meet) is held every year. In addition, the ''Akhil Bharatiya Marathi Natya Sammelan'' (All-India Marathi Theatre Meet) is also held annually. Both events are very popular amongst Maharashtrians.
But, while literature is still being written, the importance of English has been underscored by Indian strides after 1990 in the global IT market, rapid techno-educational growth and widening economic opportunities. Therefore, the Government of Maharashtra decided that English should be taught as a second language from the first standard (first grade) in schools where the medium of teaching was Marathi. This decision has been controversial and has caused many Marathi people to worry about the fate of their language, a concern which is compounded by the Marathi middle class's increasing preference for English-medium schools. Increasing use of Hindi in urban Maharashtra has also saddened Marathi people and linguists. Recently Government of Maharashtra made Marathi language compulsory in CBSE/ICSE boards are controlled by Central government. Marathi is already a compulsory subject in Maharashtra state board.[10]
At the same time, the spread of spoken Marathi has increased beyond its regular boundaries due to the increase of its élite, well-educated global Maharashtrian diaspora. Several Marathi mandals have flourished (especially in United states, Europe and Gulf countries) for meetings and cultural events by them.
Dialects
Marathi language edition of Wikipedia
Standard Marathi is based on dialects used by academicians and the print media, and is influenced by educated élite of the Pune region. Maharashtra Sahitya Parishad (MSP) is apex guiding body for literary institutions of Marathi language. From time to time, MSP helps out in discourses over various aspects of Marathi and in laying down precedents by framing rules, whenever required.
Historically, the major dialect divisions have been Ahirani, Khandeshi, Varhadi, Konkani, Wadvali and Samavedi.
Ahirani
Ahirani is spoken in the west Khandesh North Maharashtara region.
Ahirani is a language today spoken in the Jalgaon, Nandurbar, Dhule and Nashik (Baglan, Malegaon and Kalwan tehsils) districts of Maharashtra, India. It is further divided into dialects, such as Chalisgaon, Malegaon and Dhule group. Amalner is considered the cultural capital of Khandesh as Amalner has witnessed Akhil Bhartiya Marathi Sahitya Sammelan.
Adapting & bending the words from Hindi and Gujarati, Ahirani has created its own words which are never found in these languages. Ahirani is a colloquial form and uses the Devnagari script for its writing. Though it is the written form of devnagari but it is very difficult to write rather than to speak.
Khandeshi
Khandeshi is spoken in East Khandesh specifically in Yawal and Raver Talukas. Khandeshi is also called as Tawadi which is specifically spoken by Leva Patils dominant cast of east Khandesh.
Bahinabai Chaudhari is well known poet in Khandeshi, the study of her literature is studied and included in Marathi language. It is often misquoted that Bahinabai is an ahirani poet.
Varhadi
Varhādi or Vaidarbhi is spoken in the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra.
In Marathi, the retroflex lateral approximant '' () is common, while in the Varhadii dialect, it corresponds to the palatal approximant ''y'' (IPA: [j]), making this dialect quite distinct. Such phonetic shifts are common in spoken Marathi, and as such, the spoken dialects vary from one region of Maharashtra to another.
Konkani
The constitution of India considers Konkani as one of the 22 scheduled (official) languages[11]. In Maharashtra and institutions like Gomantak Marathi Academy, consider Konkani as a dialect of Marathi.[12] Konkani in Maharashtra-Goa is sub-divided into several sub-dialects. Warli, Kankon Konkani, Mālvani (spoken in southern Konkan near Malvan), Dangi are some of them. Marathis and Konkanis in Goa have had bitter fights over the official language issue.[13] Most Konkani people in Maharashtra speak and write fluent Marathi. [14]
Wadvali
This dialect may not be named thus though, but was primarily spoken by Wadvals, which essentially means agricultural plot owners, of the Naigaon, Vasai region. This language is preserved by Roman Catholics native to this region; it is also spoken by the Hindus, but due to external influence, ordinary Marathi is now more popular among them.
Samavedi
Samvedi is spoken in the interiors of Nala Sopara and Virar region to the north of Mumbai in the Vasai Taluka, Thane District of Maharashtra. The name of this language correctly suggests that its origins lie with the Samavedi Brahmins native to this region. Again this language too finds more speakers among the Roman Catholic converts native to this region (who are known as East Indians). This dialect is very different from the other Marathi dialects spoken in other regions of Maharashtra, but resembles Wadvali very closely. Both Wadvali and Samavedi have relatively higher proportion of words imported from Portuguese as compared to ordinary Marathi, because of direct influence of the Portuguese who colonized this region till 1739.
Thanjavur Marathi and Namdev Marathi
Thanjavur Marathi, Namdev Marathi and Bhavsar Marathi are spoken by many Southern Indians. This dialect evolved from the time of occupation of the Marathas in Thanjavur in southern Tamil Nadu. It has speakers in parts of Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka.
Others
★ 'Dangii' (spoken near the Maharashtra-Gujarat border)
★ 'Judæo-Marathi' (spoken by the Bene Israel Jews)
★ 'Kadodii' (spoken near Vasai)
Other dialects of Marathi include Karwari(a sub-dialect of Konkani spoken in Karwar, Mangalore and nearby areas of South Kanara), Chitpavani(original dialect spoken by Konkanastha Brahmins but most speak standard Marathi), Kudaalee(dialect spokan in Kudal Taluka of Ratnagiri District), Kunabi of Mahad, Cochin Konkani(spoken in west coast of Kerala), Konkani of Kasargod, Warli of Thane District, Gawdi of Goa(spoken by Gawdi tribes in Goa), Dakshini (Marathwada), Deshi (Eastern Konkan Ghats).
Other languages having considerable Marathi influence
★ Dakhini and Hyderabadi Urdu spoken in Hyderabad and some parts of Deccan are considerably influenced by Marathi. The grammar of ''Hyderabadi Urdu'' is adapted from Marathi. In fact, it is also called a creole between Marathi and Urdu with some Telugu words.
★ Kannada: especially the northern Karnataka Kannada has been heavily influenced by Marathi. E.g. the feature of aspiration, quite non-native to any Dravidian language, is found in northern Kannada. Also some kinship terms like ''vahini'' (brother's wife) are adapted from Marathi.
Sounds
The phoneme inventory of Marathi is similar to that of many other Indo-Āryan languages. An IPA chart of all contrastive sounds in Marathi is provided below.
| Labial | Dental | Alveolar | Retroflex | Alveopalatal | Velar | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Voiceless stops | | ||||||
| Voiced stops | |||||||
| Voiceless fricatives | |||||||
| Nasals | |||||||
| Liquids | |
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| High | |||
| Mid | |||
| Low |
Writing
Modi script was used to write Marathi
''See Devanagari script'' & ''Modi script''
Marathi is written in the Devanagari script, an alphasyllabary or abugida consisting of 16 vowel letters and 36 consonant letters making a total of 52 letters. It is written from left to right.
Vowels
Like other alphasyllabaries, Devanagari writes out syllables by adding vowel diacritics to consonant bases. The table below includes all the vowel symbols used in Marathi, along with a transliteration of each sound into the Roman alphabet and IPA.
| Devanagari | अ | आ | इ | ई | उ | ऊ | ए | ऐ | ओ | औ | अं | अः | ऋ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Transliterated | a | ā | i | ī | u | ū | e | ai | o | au | aṃ | aḥ | ṛ |
| IPA | colspan="2" | colspan="2" |
Marathi retains several features of Sanskrit that have been lost in north-Indian Sanskrit-based languages such as Hindi and Bengali, especially in terms of pronunciation of vowels and consonants. For instance, Marathi retains the original Sanskrit pronunciation of अं , ऐ , and औ . However, as was done in Gujarati, Marathi speakers tend to pronounce ऋ somewhat similar to , unlike most other Indic languages which changed it to (e.g. the original Sanskrit pronunciation of the language's name was '', while in day-to-day Marathi and Gujarati it is ''. In other Indic languages it is closer to ''). Also, the Marathi pronunciation of ज्ञ (''jña'') very closely resembles Sanskrit pronunciation, compared to ''gya'' in Hindi. Interestingly, spoken Marathi allows for original Sanskrit pronunciations of words like राम (''rama'') with an emphasis on the ending vowel sound, a feature that has been lost in Hindi.
Consonants
The table below includes all the consonant bases onto which vowel diacritics are placed. The lack of a vowel diacritic can either indicate the lack of a vowel, or the existence of the default, or "inherent", vowel, which in the case of Marathi is the schwa.
| क | ख | ग | घ | ङ |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ka | kha | ga | gha | ṅa |
| च | छ | ज | झ | ञ |
| ca ''or'' | cha ''or'' | ja ''or'' | jha ''or'' | ña |
| ट | ठ | ड | ढ | ण |
| ṭa | ṭha | ḍa | ḍha | ṇa |
| त | थ | द | ध | न |
| ta | tha | da | dha | na |
| प | फ | ब | भ | म |
| pa | pha | ba | bha | ma |
| य | र | ऱ | ल | व |
| ya | ra | ṟa | la | va |
| श | ष | स | ह | |
| śa | ṣa | sa | ha | |
| ळ | क्ष | ज्ञ | ||
| ḷa | kṣa | jña |
A defining feature of the Marathi language is the frequent substitution of the consonant ल (la) in Sanskrit words with the retroflex lateral approximant ळ (ḷa). For instance, कुळ (''kuḷa'') for the Sanskrit कुलम् (''kulam'' or clan) and कमळ (''kamaḷ'') for Sanskrit कमलम् (''kamalam'' or lotus). Such Marathi words become tongue-twisters for native speakers of North Indian languages such as Hindi and Bengali in which ळ is absent. Moreover, the unique pronunciations of the consonants च and झ in Marathi make it a difficult language to learn even for speakers of other Sanskrit-based languages like Gujarati and Hindi.
The combination of the vowels with the k-series
| Script | Pronunciation (IPA) |
|---|---|
| क | |
| का | |
| कि | |
| की | |
| कु | |
| कू | |
| क | |
| कै | |
| को | |
| कौ | |
| कं | |
| कः |
Consonant clusters
Consonant clusters in speech
Consonant clusters in writing
When two or more consecutive consonants are followed by a vowel then a ''jodakshar'' (consonant cluster) is formed. Some examples of consonant clusters are shown below:
★ 'त्या'चे - ''tyāce''
★ 'प्रस्ता'व - ''prastāv''
★ वि'द्या' - ''vidyā''
★ 'म्या'न - ''myān''
★ 'त्व'रा - ''tvarā''
★ मह'त्त्व' - ''mahattva''
★ फ'क्त' - ''phakt''
★ बाहु'ल्या' - ''bāhulyā''
Marathi has a few consonant clusters that are rarely seen in the world's languages, including the so-called "nasal aspirates" (, nh, and mh) and liquid aspirates (rh, ṟh, lh, and vh). Some examples are given below.
★ क'ण्हे'री - - "a shrub known for flowers"
★ 'न्हा'णे - - "bath"
★ 'म्ह'णून - - "because"
★ त'ऱ्हा' - ''taṟhā'' - "different way of behaving"
★ को'ल्हा' - ''kolhā'' - "fox"
★ कें'व्हा' - ''keṃvhā'' "when"
Modi script
Marathi was written in Modi script-- a cursive script designed for minimising the lifting of pen from paper while writing[15]. Most writings of Maratha empire are in Modi script. However, Persian-based scripts were also used for court documentation. With the advent of large-scale printing, Modi script fell into disuse, as it proved very difficult for type-setting. Currently due to availability of Modi fonts and the enthusiasm of the young generation the script is far from being vanished. (See Reference Links).
Grammar
Rajya Marathi Vikas Sanstha was established by Government of Maharashtra
Marathi grammar shares similarities with other modern Indo-Aryan languages such as Hindi, Gujarati, Punjabi, etc. The first modern book exclusively on Marathi Grammar was printed in 1805 by 'William Kerry'.[16] Sanskrit Grammar used to be referred more till late stages of Marathi Language.(Citation Needed)
Contemporary grammar
The contemporary grammatical rules described by Maharashtra Sahitya Parishad and endorsed by the Government of Maharashtra are supposed to take precedence in standard written Marathi. These rules are described in ''Marathi Grammar'', written by M.R Walimbe. The book is widely referred to in schools and colleges.
Sanskrit influence
Traditions of Marathi Linguistics and above mentioned rules give special status to 'Tatsam' (Without Change) words adapted from the Sanskrit language. This special status expects the rules for 'Tatsam' words be followed as of Sanskrit grammar. While this supports Marathi Language with a larger treasure of Sanskrit words to cope up with demands of new technical words whenever needed; maintains influence over Marathi.
An unusual feature of Marathi, as compared to other Indo-European languages, is that it displays the inclusive and exclusive we feature, that is common to the Dravidian languages, Rajasthani, and Gujarati.
Gender
Unlike its related languages, Marathi preserves all three grammatical genders (''Linga'') from Sanskrit.
★ masculine — पुल्लिंग (''pulliṃga'')
★ feminine — स्त्रीलिंग (''strīliṃga'')
★ neuter — नपुंसकलिंग (''naṃpusakliṃga'')
Masculine proper nouns usually end in the short vowels ''a'' or ''u'' while feminine proper nouns tend to end with the long vowels ''ā'', ''ī'' or ''ū''.
Voices
There are three grammatical voices (''Prayog'') in Marathi.
★ 'Kartarii prayog' refers to a sentence construction in which the verb changes according to the subject, which is comparable to the active voice in English.
:''Raam mhanato'' "Raam says", ''Raam aambaa khaato'' "Raam eats a mango"
★ 'Karmanii prayog' refers to a sentence construction in which the verb changes according to the object, which is like the passive voice in English.
:''Raamaane aambaa khallaa'' "The mango was eaten by Raam", ''Raamaane saangitale'' "It was told by Ram"
★ 'Bhaave prayog' refers to a sentence construction in which the verb does not change according to either the subject or the object. This is used for imperatives.
:''Maajha nirop tyaala jaaun saang'' "Give my message to him"
Pronouns
There are three grammatical persons (''Purushh'') in Marathi.
★ 'Pratham purushh' (First person)
★
★ ''mi'' "I"
★
★ ''aamhi'' "we" excluding the listener (exclusive "we")
★
★ ''aapan'' "we" including the listener (inclusive "we")
★ 'Dwitiya purushh' (Second person)
★
★ ''tuu'' "you"
★
★ ''tumhi'' "you" (plural or formal)
★
★ ''aapan'' (extremely formal)
★ 'Trutiya purushh' (Third person)
★
★ ''to'' "he"
★
★ ''tii'' "she"
★
★ ''te'' "it"
★
★ ''te'' "they" (masculine) or "he" (formal)
★
★ ''tyaa'' "they" (feminine)
★
★ ''tii'' "they" (neuter)
Parts of speech
Marathi words can be classified in any of the following parts:
# 'naama' (noun)
# 'visheshanaama' (proper noun)
# 'sarvanaam' (pronoun)
# 'visheshaNa' (adjective)
# 'kriyaavisheshaNa' (adverb)
# 'kriyapada' (verb)
# 'avyaya' (indeclinables or uninflected word)
#
★ 'ubhayanvayi avyaya'
#
★ 'shabdayogi avyaya'
#
★ 'kevalaprayogi avyaya'
Sentence structure
The usual word order in a sentence is Subject Object Verb (SOV); however, because of the extensive declension and conjugation patterns, order can be changed for stess purposes without a loss in meaning (unlike English).
Nominal inflection
Marathi is a highly inflected language, like the other ancient Indo-Europeanlanguages such as its own mother Sanskrit. While English uses prepositions, in Marathi, such functions are indicated through the use of case-suffixes. These are referred to as ''vibhaktii pratyay''. There are eight such ''vibhaktii'' in Marathi. The form of the original word changes when such a suffix is to be attached to the word, and the new, modified root is referred to as ''saamaanya ruup'' of the original word. For example, the word ("horse") gets transformed into when the suffix ''-var'' ("on") is attached to it to form ("on the horse").
Marathi organisations
Many government and semi-government organisations exist which work for regulation, promotion and enrichment of Marathi language. These are either initiated or funded by Government of Maharashtra. Few prominent Marathi organisations are given below:
★ Rajya Marathi Vikas Sanstha
★ Maharashtra Sahitya Parishad, Pune
★ Marathi Vishwakosh (encyclopedia) project
★ Akhil Bharatiya Marathi Sahitya Mahamandal
★ Vidarbha Sahitya Sangh
★ Marathwada Sahitya Parishad
★ Mumbai Marathi Sahitya Sangh
★ Gomantak Marathi academy
Vocabulary
Sharing of linguistic resourses with other languages
A signboard in Marathi
Over a period of many centuries Marathi language and people came in touch with many other languages and dialects. The primary influence of Prakrit, Maharashtri, Apbhramsha and Sanskrit is understandable.
While Marathi has shared both directions, vocabulary and grammar with languages like Indian Dravidian languages, and a few foreign languages like Persian, Arabic, English and a little from Portuguese.
While recent genome studies suggest some amount of political and trade relations between the Indian subcontinent and East Africa, Middle East, Central Asia over a millennium, these studies are still not conclusive about exact effect on linguistcs.
Influence of foreign languages
★ Usage of punctuation marks was one of the major contributions to Indic script by foreign languages. Previously, due to Sanskritised poetry, texts punctuation requirements of many texts may have been less.
Word formation and origin
Marathi has taken and given words from/to Sanskrit, Kannada, Hindi, Urdu, Arabic, Persian, and Portuguese.
★ ''Adakitta'' "nutcracker" directly borrowed from ''Kannada''
★ ''Khurchii'' "chair" is derived from Arabic ''kursi''
★ ''Jaahiraat'' "advertisement" is derived from Persian ''zaahiraat'' See Note 1
★ ''Shiphaaras'' "recommendation" is derived from Persian sifarish
★ ''Marjii'' "wish" is derived from Persian "marzi"
★ ''Batataa'' "potato", is derived from Portuguese
★ ''Ananas'' "pineapple", is derived from Portuguese See Note 2
★ ''Niga'' "looking after" is derived from Persian ''nîgâh'' "sight-vision"
★ ''Hajeri'' Attendance from ''Hajiri'' Urdu
A lot of English words are commonly used in conversation, and are considered to be totally assimilated into the Marathi vocabulary. These include "pen" (native Marathi ), "shirt" (''sadaraa'').
Many Marathi words are very close to English. It is interesting to have a look at its similarity.
★ ''Navy'' compared to ''Nau''
★ ''Dew'' compared to ''Dav''
★ ''Tree'' compared to ''Taru''
Forming complex words
Marathi uses many morphological processes to join words together, forming complex words. These processes are traditionally referred to as ''sandhi'' (from Sanskrit, "combination"). For example, ''ati'' + ''uttam'' gives the word ''atyuttam''.
Another method of combining words is referred to as ''samaas'' (from Sanskrit, "margin"). There are no reliable rules to follow to make a ''samaas''. When the second word starts with a consonant, a ''sandhi'' can not be formed, but a ''samaas'' can be formed. For example, ''miith-bhaakar'' ("salt-bread"), ''udyog-patii'' ("businessman"), ("eight-hands", name of a Hindu goddess), and so on. There are different names given to each type of ''samaas''.
Counting
Like many other languages, Marathi uses distinct names for the numbers 1 to 20 and each multiple of 10, and composite ones for those greater than 20.
As with other Indic languages, there are distinct names for the fractions ¼, ½, and ¾. They are ''paava'', ''ardhaa'', and respectively. For most fractions greater than 1, the prefixes ''savvaa-'', , are used. There are special names for 1.5 and 2.5 .
The powers of ten are as follows:
★ 100: ''shambhar'' (also constructed with number prefix and "-she" suffix)
★ 1,000: ''hazaar'' (or ''sahasra'', a word close to the Sanskrit version)
★ 100,000: ''laakh'' (or ''laksha'')
★ 10,000,000: ''koti''
★ 1,000,000,000: ''abja''
★ 10,000,000,000: ''kharva''
★ 100,000,000,000: ''nikharva''
★ 100,000,000,000,000,000: ''parardha''
A positive integer is read by breaking it up from the tens digit leftwards, into parts each containing two digits, the only exception being the hundreds place containing only one digit instead of two. For example, 1,234,567 is read as ''12 laakh 34 hazaar 5 she 67''.
Example short phrases
| Words/phrases | Transliteration | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| नमस्कार | Namaskār. | Hi/Hello. |
| तुम्ही कसे आहात? | Tumhī kase āhāt? | How do you do? |
| तू कसा आहेस? | Tū kasā āhes? | How are you? ''(to a male)'' |
| तू कशी आहेस? | Tū kaśī āhes? | How are you? ''(to a female)'' |
| आपण कसे आहात? | Āpaṇ kase āhāt? | How are you? ''(formal)'' |
| तुम्हाला भेटून आनंद झाला | Tumhālā bheṭūn ānaṃd jhālā. | Pleased to meet you. |
| पुन्हा भेटू | Punhā bheṭū. | Goodbye. ''(Lit.: "We will meet again.")'' |
| धन्यवाद | Dhanyavād. | Thank you. |
| हो | Ho. | Yes. |
| नाही | Nāhī. | No. |
| नको | Nako. | No, thank you. |
| किती? | Kitī? | How much?/How many? |
| कुठे? | Kuṭhe? | Where? |
| कसे? | Kase? | How? |
| केव्हा? | Kevhā? | When? |
| कोण? | Koṇ? | Who? |
| काय? | Kāy? | What? |
| शुभ रात्री | Śubh rātrī. | Good night. |
Marathi on computers and internet
Marathi was weak on computers and internet like other Indian languages. But of late, with the introduction of language localisation projects and new technologies, various software and internet applications have been introduced. Shrilipi, Shivaji, Kiran fonts were used prior to introduction of Unicode standard for Devanagari script. Various Marathi typing software (Baraha is most used) and display interface packages are now available on both Windows and Linux. Many Marathi websites including prominent Marathi newspapers have became popular epecially with Maharashtrians outside India. Online projects like Marathi wikipedia, Marathi blogroll and Marathi blogs are gaining popularity. See more notable websites in #External links section.
See also
★ Wikipedia in Marathi
★ Maharashtra
★ Marathi people
★ Marathi literature
★ Modi script, Devanagari
★
★ Languages of India
★ List of national languages of India
★ List of Indian languages by total speakers
References
1. Languages Spoken by More Than 10 Million People
2. Top 30 languages of the world
3. Languages in Descending Order of Strength in India : 1991 Census
4. arts, South Asian." Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica 2007 Ultimate Reference Suite.
5. Higher studies in Marathi linguistics
6. History of medieval Hindu India
(BEING A history of Indian from 600 to 1200 AD) Vol I pg.317 by C.V.Vaidya
7. Indiasite's page on Marathi language
8. Marathyancha Itihaas by Dr.Kolarkar (pg.3)
9. Dnyaneshwari
10. Marathi to be compulsory in CBSE, ICSE curricula schools
11. Official languages of India
12. Goa Marathi Academy
13. Marathi vs Konkani debate continues in Goa
14. "Aapalaa Maharashtra: Parampara va Pragati" (Our Maharashtra: Traditions and Progress) (1985) - A Government of Maharashtra publication.
15. Modi lipi
16. Maharashtra times article
Publications
★ Marathi: The Language and its Linguistic Traditions - Prabhakar Machwe, Indian and Foreign Review, 15 March 1985.
★ 'Atyavashyak Marathi Vyakaran' (''Essential Marathi Grammar'') - Dr. V. L. Vardhe
★ 'Marathi Vyakaran' (''Marathi Grammar'') - Moreshvar Sakharam More.
★ 'Marathi Vishwakosh, Khand 12 (''Marathi World Encyclopedia, Volume 12''), Page 1197 - Maharashtra Rajya Vishwakosh Nirmiti Mandal, Mumbai
External links
'Marathi and Internet'
★ Marathi Wikipedia
★ Marathi blogs (Blogroll)
★ Manogat-chat forum
''Portals''
★ Marathiworld
★ Maayboli
'Marathi Dictionary'
★ Shabdabandha an online Marathi-Marathi dictionary
★ Marathi-English (J.T.Molesworth)
★ Marathi-English (Aryabhusan)
'Marathi newspapers'
★ Esakal
★ Maharashtra Times
★ Loksatta
★ Lokmat
'Marathi Miscellaneous'
★ Marathi: history and reference
★ Ethnologue report for Marathi
★ Marathi documents
'Learn Marathi'
★ Learn to speak Marathi
★ Marathi phrases in English
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