History of Bengali Language and Literature c8.6

c8.6

But, curiously, in the vernacular literature of the Hindus, inspite of this common use of foreign words, our writers showed great unwillingness to adopt non-Sanskritic words. In the old literature of Bengal we seldom come across foreign words. In the pride of what Hindus considered to be their own superior civilization, they remained aloof from Muhammadan contact as for as practicable, contented with their own social life and the cultivation of their classical literature. They cared not who administered the country; thus the word সহর (city) is of Muhammadan origin, while গাঁ (a village) remained true to the Sanskritic form. In the village the Hindu element was not sullied by the touch of anything foreign. The word চাঁদ (moon), সূর্য্য (sun), বায়ু (air), পানী (water) ফুল (flower) and those denoting objects of nature and social life retained their original Sanskrit or Prakitic forms—not to speak of words relating to religious functions which remained unchanged. As nearly all Bengali works of the period deal with social and religious subjects, there are scarcely any foreign words in them, and only a sprinkling of these occurs in the descriptions of the Courts of kings.