Indian Epigraphy c7.s3: 3. Language

Indian Epigraphy c7.s3

Language: English

3. Language

c7.s3.1

The majority of Indo-Muslim inscriptions are written in Persian. Many of them are in Arabic and some partly in Arabic and partly in Persian. There is another kind of bilingual records which are written in Arabic or Persian on the one hand and Sanskrit or a regional language like Marāṭhī, Kannaḍa or Telugu on the other.² Inscriptions in more languages than wo are also known.¹

c7.s3.2

² For some bilingual records, see *A. R. Ep.*, 1952-53, Nos. A 15 (C-87); B 55-A, 192-A(C-78), 623-A(C-107), 566-A(C-16c); 1954-55, Nos. B 89-A(C-90); 513(C-136), 517 (C-155), 521 (G-71). The language of one such record is Hindī written in both Persian and Devanāgarī characters

c7.s3.3

¹ For an inscription in Persian, Sanskrit and Gujarātī, see Bull. Baroda Mus., 1953-55, pp. 73 ff.

c7.s3.4

The earliest Indo-Muslim inscriptions are in Arabic except the epigraph in the Quwwatu’l Islām mosque at Delhi, which is written in Arabic and Persian. Its date is 1191-92 A.D., though it may have been set up some years later. Arabic continued to be the language of Indo-Muslim epigraphy till the latest decades of the 13th century. But, with the rise of the Khaljīs, from about the beginning of the 14th century, Persian is found more frequently in epigraphical records and its popularity gradually increased, though Arabic was not totally ousted since religious inscriptions continued to be written in that language. Arabic was more popular than Persian in Bengal. With the establishment of Mughal rule in India in the 16th century, Persian began to be generally used in State records as well as in inscriptions and, in the first half of the 18th century, it ousted Arabic almost completely. There is an Urdū inscription of the middle of the 18th century.²

c7.s3.5

² Ep. Indo-Mosl., 1909-1910, p. 31. A chronogram, supposed to be in old Urdū, giving the date of the erection of a mosque at Ahmedabad, is found in an inscription dated 1555-56 A.D. See ibid., 1935-1936, p. 51. For some versified Urdū inscriptions of the 19th century, see A. R. Ep., 1953-54, Nos. C 36, 53, 63, 65.

c7.s3.6

With few exceptions, the Arabic inscriptions are in prose. Of the versified records in Arabic, one dated 1313-14 A.D. from Tribeni (Hooghly District, West Bengal) is the earliest of its kind in India. It also provides the earliest chronogram among Indo-Muslim inscriptions.³ Earlier Persian inscriptions are generally in prose. The earliest dated inscription in Persian verse is the Hansi epigraph⁴ of ‘Alāu’ddīn Khaljī. Versified Persian inscriptions became more common at a later date. The majority of the inscriptions are not good literary compositions and exhibit grammatical inaccuracy and disregard for the rules of prosody.

Linked texts (1)

Annual Report on Indian Epigraphy