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When was Tamil language discovered?
The earliest Tamil writing is attested in inscriptions and potsherds from the 5th century bce. Three periods have been distinguished through analyses of grammatical and lexical changes: Old Tamil (from about 450 bce to 700 ce), Middle Tamil (700–1600), and Modern Tamil (from 1600).
Which Dravidian language is oldest?
Tamil. Of the four literary languages in the Dravidian family, Tamil is the oldest, with examples dating to the early Common Era. In the early 21st century, Tamil was spoken by more than 66 million people, mostly residing in India, northern Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Singapore, Mauritius, Fiji, and Myanmar (Burma).
Which is the first language in the world Tamil or Sanskrit?
Sanskrit (5000 years old) – World’s Oldest Language Source Unlike Tamil, which is still a widely spoken language, Sanskrit is the oldest language in the world but fell out of common usage around 600 B.C. It is now a liturgical language – the holy languages found in the scriptures of Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism.
Is Tulu derived from Tamil?
Separated early from Proto-South Dravidian, Tulu has several features not found in Tamil–Kannada. However, in modern times the Tulu language is mostly written using the Kannada script. The Tulu language is known for its oral literature in the form of epic poems called pardana.
Is Tamil a Dravidian language?
The largest group of the Dravidian languages is South Dravidian, with almost 150 million speakers. Tamil, Kannada and Malayalam make up around 98\% of the speakers, with 75 million, 44 million and 37 million native speakers, respectively.
What is the origin of Tamil language?
Tamil (தமிழ்) belongs to the Southern branch of the Dravidian language family, spoken in southern India and northeastern Sri Lanka from prehistoric times.
How many people in the world speak Tamil?
The worldwide population of first-language speakers of Tamil is estimated at around 69 million people with as many as additional 8 million speaking it as a second language. (Ethnologue). Tamil is one of the 22 official languages and 14 regional languages of India. It is the official language of the state of Tamil Nadu.
What are the features of Tamil language?
Tamil 1 Status. Tamil is one of the 22 official languages and 14 regional languages of India. 2 Dialects. The dialects of Tamil have evolved along three different dimensions. 3 Structure. The phonemes of modern standard Tamil include native sounds (‘low’ variety) and peripheral sounds that came from lexical borrowings (‘high’ variety).
Why does Tamil have so many suffixes?
Like other Dravidian languages, Tamil is agglutinative, i.e., it adds suffixes, one after another, to stems to form words and to express grammatical functions. Since there is no limit on the number of suffixes, some words in Tamil can be very long.