Deccani language

Deccani
دکنی
A folio from the Kitab-i-Navras, a collection of Deccani poetry attributed to the Adil Shahi king Ibrahim Adil Shah II (16th-17th centuries)
Native toIndia
RegionDeccan
(Maharashtra, Karnataka, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Goa)
EthnicityDeccanis
Standard forms
Dialects
Perso-Arabic (Urdu alphabet)
Language codes
ISO 639-3–
Glottologdakh1244

Deccani (دکنی, dakanī or دکھنی, dakhanī;[A] also known as Deccani Urdu and Deccani Hindi)[1][2][3][4][5][6] is an Indo-Aryan language based on a form of Hindustani spoken in the Deccan region of south-central India and is the native language of the Deccani people.[7][8] The historical form of Deccani sparked the development of Urdu literature during the late-Mughal period.[9][10] Deccani arose as a lingua franca under the Delhi and Bahmani Sultanates, as trade and migration from the north introduced Hindustani to the Deccan. It later developed a literary tradition under the patronage of the Deccan Sultanates. Deccani itself came to influence modern standard Urdu and later Hindi.[7][11]

The official language of the Deccan Sultanates was Persian, and due to this, Deccani has had an influence from the Persian language. In the modern era, it has mostly survived as a spoken lect and is not a literary language. Deccani differs from northern Hindustani sociolects due to archaisms retained from the medieval era, as well as a convergence with and loanwords from the Deccan's regional languages like Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Marathi spoken in the states of Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and some parts of Maharashtra.[7] Deccani has been increasingly influenced by Standard Urdu, especially noticed in Hyderabadi Urdu, which serves as its formal register.

There are three primary dialects of Deccani spoken today: Hyderabadi Urdu, Mysore Urdu, and Madrasi Urdu. Hyderabadi Urdu is the closest of these dialects to Standard Urdu and the most spoken.[11]

The term "Deccani" and its variants are often used in two different contexts: a historical, obsolete one, referring to the medieval-era literary predecessor of Hindi-Urdu;[12][7] and an oral one, referring to the Urdu dialects spoken in many areas of the Deccan today.[13] Both contexts have intricate historical ties.


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  1. ^ Khan, Abdul Jamil (2006). Urdu/Hindi: An Artificial Divide: African Heritage, Mesopotamian Roots, Indian Culture & Britiah Colonialism. Algora Publishing. ISBN 978-0-87586-438-9.
  2. ^ Azam, Kousar J. (9 August 2017). Languages and Literary Cultures in Hyderabad. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-351-39399-7.
  3. ^ Verma, Dinesh Chandra (1990). Social, Economic, and Cultural History of Bijapur. Idarah-i Adabiyat-i Delli. p. 141. Deccani Hindi is indebted for its development to the Muslim poets and writers chiefly belonging to the kingdom of Bijapur.
  4. ^ Arun, Vidya Bhaskar (1961). A Comparative Phonology of Hindi and Panjabi. Panjabi Sahitya Akademi. p. xii. The Deccani Hindi Poetry in its earlier phase was not so much Persianised as it became later.
  5. ^ Alam, Sarwar (19 August 2019). Cultural Fusion of Sufi Islam: Alternative Paths to Mystical Faith. Routledge. ISBN 978-0-429-87294-5.
  6. ^ Kellman, Steven G.; Lvovich, Natasha (30 September 2021). The Routledge Handbook of Literary Translingualism. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-000-44153-6.
  7. ^ a b c d Kama Maclean (26 September 2021). "Language and Cinema: Schisms in the Representation of Hyderabad". Retrieved 12 February 2024. The Deccani language developed between the fourteenth and seventeenth centuries in the Deccan—it is known to be an old form of Hindi and Urdu. Deccani was influenced by the other languages of the region, that is, it borrowed some words from Telugu, Kannada and Marathi. Deccani was known as the language from the South and it later travelled to the north of India and influenced Khari Boli. It also had a significant influence on the development of Hindi and Urdu.
  8. ^ Emeneau, Murray B.; Fergusson, Charles A. (21 November 2016). Linguistics in South Asia. Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. ISBN 978-3-11-081950-2.
  9. ^ Imam, Syeda (14 May 2008). The Untold Charminar. Penguin UK. ISBN 978-81-8475-971-6.
  10. ^ Alam, Sarwar (19 August 2019). Cultural Fusion of Sufi Islam: Alternative Paths to Mystical Faith. Routledge. ISBN 978-0-429-87294-5.
  11. ^ a b "Urdu-Phonology and Morphology" (PDF).
  12. ^ Rahman 2011, p. 22.
  13. ^ Rahman 2011, p. 4.