Tamil is one of the languages of the Dravidian group. It is widely distributed in southern India, is one of the official in this country. The unique antiquity of this language, its direct connection with the richest culture of India, its wide area of distribution prompt an increasing number of people to study Tamil.
Tamil speakers
The majority of Tamil-speaking Indians live in Tamil Nadu - about 92% of the total living population of this part of the country considers Tamil to be their mother tongue. Figures of researchers claim that, besides India, it can be heard in Sri Lanka, in Malaysia, Singapore, they speak it in Mauritania and North Africa. Many residents of the southern Indian states emigrated and now live in compact groups in the UK, Canada and the USA. The total number of Tamil speakers is more than sixty million people.
Hoary antiquity
The word "Tamil" in the Russian language came to us from its English transcription. In local languages, the last sound of the word is transmitted using 'l' or 'zh'. The original name is spelled like this:
The Dravidian language family has many related dialects. The most common of them are Telugu, Kennar, Oraon, Malto and others. This group also has Tamil. He has his own, quite ancient literature. The oldest records were found on petrified palm leaves; their age dates back to 200 BC. e. Other Tamil inscriptions were discovered in 2005. They are one of the oldest written monuments of mankind and date back to the 10th century BC. These records proved that the Tamil language does not come from Sanskrit - it is a completely independent adverb that incorporates a lot of words from Sanskrit, Sinhala and other local languages.
Repeated attempts were made to remove the borrowed funds and restore the Tamil language to its original purity. The linguistic battle launched by purists Maraimalay Adigal and Parithimaar Kalaygnar became known as 'thanith thamizh iyakkam'. Translated into Russian, this means a movement for pure Tamil. Therefore, at present, in public and official speech, words borrowed from Sanskrit are almost not found in texts.
Thirukural
One of the most famous literary masterpieces written in the languages of India is called Thirukkural. The author of the creation, Thiruvalluval, most likely was a contemporary of Christ. The first part of the poem is best known - “About Virtue”. This work is the backbone of Tamil ancient literature.
It was often quoted by thinkers of the 19th and 20th centuries, and Leo Tolstoy considered Thiurkkural one of the greatest books of mankind. This ancient work was highly appreciated by Nobel Prize winner A. Schweizer, who knew the Tamil language, translator and missionary J. Pope, who popularized the Thirukkural, and the great father of India, Mahatma Gandhi.
Dialects
British researchers, who published their report in the famous publication The Ethnologue, name more than twenty dialects of the Tamil language that exist today. Geographically, they were divided into six zones of greatest distribution: northern, eastern, southern, western, central and the dialect of Sri Lanka. On the island, the Tamil language was preserved in its conservative form, while the mainland dialects were subjected to serious tests, withstanding the onslaught of foreign words and lexical forms from other languages.
About Tamil - Interesting
It is interesting to know how the Tamil language works. Two-thirds of its alphabet looks standard - in the modern literary Tamil there are 18 consonants and 12 main letters. But the third part - the largest, consists of special alphabetic combinations of uyirmeyelutta. There are 216 of them! These "syllables" form the basis of the Tamil language.
In mathematics, Tamil can also be surprising. By the way, Tamil is the name of the Tamil language. The numbers in this ancient language have one feature: they are not tied to tens and hundreds, and each number has an owl “name”. And not only integer natural numbers, but even the most complex fractions. For example, the word immi refers to the fraction 1/320, and 1/7 refers to anu. Proper fractions even have fractions that are practically not used in real life.
Classic tamil
In Berkeley, one of the most famous American universities (California), an annual conference is held on ancient and modern Tamil. Within the walls of Berkeley, Tamil is considered a classic language, it is ancient, has its own independent tradition, a lot of literary works are written on Tamil. This language is as old as Koin (classical Greek), and much older than Arabic. For many centuries, Tamil tried to avoid verbal borrowing and the spread of foreign words in his native language. The language especially resisted the influence of Sanskrit. That is why he retained his lexical composition for several thousand years. In 2004, Tamil was recognized as the first traditional language of India.
The struggle for the native language
Tamil people are very kind to their language. In their native state, they believe that if the national language of India - Hindi - spreads to their lands, Tamil speakers will quickly forget their native language. The example of language advocates is the cities of Hyderabad, Mumbai, Kolkata, where local languages are almost obsolete, and the population mainly speaks Hindi or English.
C. Annadurai, former chief minister of the state of Tamil Nadu, argued that the decision to approve Hindi as the national language was wrong. "Why in India is a tiger considered a national animal, not a rat? After all, most rats?" He asked. With this statement, Annadurai emphasized that there are issues that cannot be resolved by a simple majority vote. The former minister is listened to both in the Indian Parliament and outside this great country. The struggle for the purity of the ancient dialect continues. I'd like to keep the classic Tamil for posterity of speakers of this amazing language.