Nepali Language

Nepali (; , ) is an Indo-Aryan language native to the Himalayas region of South Asia. It is the official, and most widely spoken, language of Nepal, where it also serves as a '' lingua franca''. Nepali has official status in the Indian state of Sikkim and in the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration of West Bengal. It is spoken by about a quarter of Bhutan's population. Nepali also has a significant number of speakers in the states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Himachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Uttarakhand. In Myanmar it is spoken by the Burmese Gurkhas. The Nepali diaspora in the Middle East, Brunei, Australia and worldwide also use the language. Nepali is spoken by approximately 16 million native speakers and another 9 million as a second language.

Nepali is commonly classified within the Eastern Pahari group of the Northern zone of Indo-Aryan.
The language originated from the Sinja Valley, Karnali Province then the capital city of the Khasa Kingdom around the 10th and 14th centuries. It developed proximity to a number of Indo-Aryan languages, most significantly to other Pahari languages. Nepali was originally spoken by the Khas people, an Indo-Aryan ethno-linguistic group native to the Himalayan region of South Asia. The earliest inscription in the Nepali language is believed to be an inscription in Dullu, Dailekh District which was written around the reign of King Bhupal Damupal around the year 981. The institutionalisation of the Nepali language arose during the rule of the Kingdom of Gorkha (later became known as the Kingdom of Nepal) in the 16th century. Over the centuries, different dialects of the Nepali language with distinct influences from Sanskrit, Maithili, Hindi, and Bengali are believed to have emerged across different regions of the current-day Nepal and Uttarakhand, making Nepali the ''lingua franca''.

Nepali is a highly fusional language with relatively free word order, although the dominant arrangement is subject–object–verb word order (SOV). There are three major levels or gradations of honorific: low, medium and high. Low honorific is used where no respect is due, medium honorific is used to signify equal status or neutrality, and high honorific signifies respect. Like all modern Indo-Aryan languages, Nepali grammar has syncretized heavily, losing much of the complex declensional system present in the older languages. Nepali developed significant literature within a short period of a hundred years in the 19th century. Around 1830, several Nepali poets wrote on themes from the Sanskrit epics ''Ramayana'' and the '' Bhagavata Purana'', which was followed by Bhanubhakta Acharya translating the ''Ramayana'' in Nepali which received "great popularity for the colloquial flavour of its language, its religious sincerity, and its realistic natural descriptions".

Etymology

The initial name of Nepali language was ''Khas Kura''. An archaic dialect of the language is spoken in Karnali. During the Shah dynasty the language was also referred to as ''Gorakhā bhāṣā'' ( ne, गोरखा भाषा), meaning ''language of the Gorkhas''.Lienhard, Siegfried (1992). ''Songs of Nepal: An Anthology of Nevar Folksongs and Hymns.'' New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas. . Page 3.आजभन्दा करिब नौ दशकअघि मात्रै देशको नाम ‘नेपाल’ का रूपमा स्विकारिएको हो भने, पहिले खस–पर्वते–गोर्खाली भनिने भाषालाई ‘नेपाली’ नामकरण गरिएको हो । ''Gorkha Bhasa Prakashini Samiti'' (Gorkha Language Publishing Committee), a government institution established in 1913 (B.S. 1970) for advancement of Gorkha Bhasa, renamed itself as ''Nepali Bhasa Prakashini Samiti'' (Nepali Language Publishing Committee) in 1933 (B.S. 1990), and is currently known as ''Sajha Prakashan''. The language is also called ''Parvate Kurā'' ( ne, पर्वते कुरा), which literally means ''talks of the hills''. The name ''Pāṣyā Bolī'' ( ne, पाष्या बोली) was also briefly used during the regime of Jung Bahadur Rana. The Tibetan nationalities refer to the language as ''Khasa Bhāṣā''. नेवाः समुदायमा "खे भाये" वा "पर्त्या भाये", तामाङ भाषामा "ज्यार्दी ग्योइ" वा "ज्यार्ती ग्योत्", चेपाङ भाषामा "खस्अन्त", ल्होवा भाषामा "रोङकेक", इत्यादि । Nepali language is known as ''Khae Bhāe'' ( Nepal Bhasa: , ) in the Newar community, ''Jyārdī Gyoī'' (Tamang: ) or ''Jyārtī Gyot'' (Tamang: ) in the Tamang community, ''Khasanta'' ( Chepang: ) in the Chepang community, ''Roṅakeka'' ( Lhowa: ) in the Lhowa community and ''Khase Puka'' ( Dungmali: ) in Dungmali community. In Bhutan, the language is known as Lhotshamkha in Dzongkha.

History

Early Nepali

The earliest evidence and inscriptions of dialects related to the Nepali language support the theory of a linguistic intrusion from the West or Northwest Himalayas into the Central Himalayas in the present-day regions of Western Nepal during the rule of Khasas, an Indo-Aryan speaking group, who migrated from the northwest. The oldest discovered inscription in the Nepali language is believed to be the Dullu Inscription, believed to have been written around the reign of King Bhupal Damupal around the year 981. Changes of phonological patterns indicate that Nepali is related to other Northwest Indian languages, including Sindhi, Punjabi, and Lahnda. Comparative reconstructions based on vocabulary have substantiated the relations of the Nepali language to proto- Dardic, Pahari, Sindhi, Lahnda, and Punjabi. Archaeological and historical investigations show that modern Nepali descends from the language spoken by the ancient Khasha people. There is some mention of the word ''khasha'' in Sanskrit legal, historical, and literary texts like Manusmriti (circa 100 CE), Puranas (350–1500), and the Rajatarangini (1148). The Khashas are documented to have ruled over a vast territory comprising what is now western Nepal, parts of Garhwal and Kumaon in northern India, and some parts of southwestern Tibet. King Ashoka Challa (1255–1278) is believed to have proclaimed himself Khasha-Rajadhiraja (emperor of the Khashas) in a copper-plate inscription found in Bodh Gaya, and several other copper plates in ancient Nepali have been traced back to the king's descendants.

Middle Nepali

The Ashoka Challa inscription of 1255 is the earliest example of modern Nepali. The languages of these early inscriptions are considered to be a dialect of Jumla and West Nepal, rather than a predecessor of the dialect of Gorkha, which became the modern Nepali language.

The earliest example of modern Nepali is the literary manuscript ''Svastanivratakatha,'' dated 1648. Other such early literary texts in modern Nepali are the anonymous version of the "Khandakhadya" (dated 1649), the "Bajapariksha" (1700) and "Jvarotpatticikitsa" written by Banivilas Jytoirvid (1773) and "Prayascittapradipa" written by Premnidhi Pant (1780). The 1670 Rani Pokhari inscription of King Pratap Malla, another early example of modern Nepali, indicates the significant increment of Nepali speakers in Kathmandu valley. The currently popular variant of Nepali is believed to have originated around 500 years ago with the mass migration of a branch of Khas people from the Karnali- Bheri-Seti eastward to settle in lower valleys of the Karnali and the Gandaki basin that were well-suited to rice cultivation. Over the centuries, different dialects of the Nepali language with distinct influences from Sanskrit, Maithili, Hindi, and Bengali are believed to have emerged across different regions of the current-day Nepal and Uttarakhand, making Khasa the lingua franca.

The institutionalisation of the Nepali language is believed to have started with the Shah kings of Gorkha Kingdom, in the modern day Gorkha District of Nepal. In 1559, a prince of Lamjung, Dravya Shah established himself on the throne of Gorkha with the help of local Khas and Magars. He raised an army of Khas people under the command of Bhagirath Panta. Later, in the late 18th century, his descendant, Prithvi Narayan Shah, raised and modernized an army of Chhetri, Thakuri, Magars, Gurung people, and others and set out to conquer and consolidate dozens of small principalities in the Himalayas. Since Gorkha had replaced the original Khas homeland, Khaskura was redubbed ''Gorkhali'' "language of the Gorkhas".

Modern Nepali

One of the most notable military achievements of Prithvi Narayan Shah was the conquest of Kathmandu Valley, a region called Nepal at the time. After the overthrowing of the Malla rulers, Kathmandu was established as Prithvi Narayan's new capital. The Khas people originally referred to their language as ''Khas kurā'' ("Khas speech"), which was also known as ''Parbatiya'' (or ''Parbattia'' or ''Paharia'', meaning language of the hill country). The Newar people used the term " Gorkhali" as a name for this language, as they identified it with the Gorkhali conquerors. The Gorkhalis themselves started using this term to refer to their language at a later stage. The census of India prior to independence used the term ''Naipali'' at least from 1901 to 1951, the 1961 census replacing it with ''Nepali''.

Historically, Sanskrit has been a significant source of vocabulary for the Nepali language. According to exclusive phonological evidences observed by lexicographer Sir Ralph Turner, Nepali language is closely related to Punjabi, Lahnda, Hindi and Kumaoni while it appears to share some distinguishing features with the other Indo-Aryan languages like Rajasthani, Gujarati and Bangla. Ethnologist Brian Houghton Hodgson stated that the Khas or Parbattia language is an "Indian Prakrit" brought by colonies from south of the Nepalese hills, and the whole structure including the eighth-tenth portion of the vocabulary of it is "substantially Hindee" due to the influences and loanwords it shares with Arabic and Farsi.

Contemporary Nepali

Expansion – particularly to the north, west, and south – brought the growing state into conflict with the British and the Chinese. This led to wars that trimmed back the territory to an area roughly corresponding to Nepal's present borders. After the Gorkha conquests, the Kathmandu valley or ''Nepal'' became the new center of politics. As the entire conquered territory of the Gorkhas ultimately became ''Nepal'', in the early decades of the 20th century, Gorkha language activists in India, especially Darjeeling and Varanasi, began petitioning Indian universities to adopt the name 'Nepali' for the language. Also in an attempt to disassociate himself with his Khas background, the Rana monarch Jung Bahadur Rana decreed that the term Gorkhali be used instead of ''Khas kurā'' to describe the language. Meanwhile, the British Indian administrators had started using the term "Nepal" to refer to the Gorkha kingdom. In the 1930s, Nepal government also adopted this term fully. Subsequently, the Khas language came to be known as "Nepali language".

The earliest Nepali grammar to have survived was written by Veerendra Keshari Aryal entitled "Nepali Vyakaran" and it is dated around 1891 to 1905. The grammar is based on Panini model and it equates Nepali with Prakrit and labels it as "the mountain Prakrit". However, later the official institution established in 1912 for formalizing Nepali language, the "Gorkha Bhasha Prakashini Samiti", accepted the 1920 grammar text entitled ''Candrika Gorkha Bhasha Vyakaran'' by Pandit Hemraj Pandey as the official grammar of the Nepali language. Nepali is spoken indigenously over most of Nepal west of the Gandaki River, then progressively less further to the east.

Official status

Nepal

Part 1 of the Nepali Constitution deals with the official language of the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal. Under Article 6, the official "language of the nation" will be "all languages spoken as the mother tongues in Nepal". In Article 7, the official language of Nepal have been written, which includes Nepali in Devanagari script:

# The Nepali language in the Devanagari script shall be the official language of Nepal.
# A Province may, by a provincial law, determine one or more than one languages of the nation spoken by a majority of people within the Province as its official language or languages, in addition to the Nepali language.
# Other matters relating to language shall be as decided by the Government of Nepal on recommendation of the Language Commission.

India

On August 31, 1992, the Parliament of India passed a bill to amend the Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of India to give Konkani, Manipuri, and Nepali as a languages with official status in India. Nepali has official status in the Indian state of Sikkim and in the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration of West Bengal. Nepali also has a significant number of speakers in the states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Himachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Uttarakhand.

Bhutan

Despite Nepali language being spoken by about a quarter of population in Bhutan. It has no official status in Bhutan, the native speakers of Nepali are known as ''Lhotshampa'' ("southerners"). Many of Nepali-language speaking Bhutanese people were displaced by various laws enacted by the Bhutanese government.

Geographical distribution

According to the 2011 national census, 44.6% of the population of Nepal speaks Nepali as its first language. and 32.8% speak Nepali as a second language. Ethnologue reports 12,300,000 speakers within Nepal (from the 2011 census).

Nepali is traditionally spoken in the hilly regions of Nepal. The language is prominently used by the government of Nepal and is the everyday language of the local population. The exclusive use of Nepali in the court system and by the government of Nepal, however, is being challenged. Gaining recognition for other languages of Nepal was one of the goals of the decades-long Maoist insurgency.

In Bhutan, native Nepali speakers, known as ''Lhotshampa'', are estimated at 35% of the population. This number includes displaced Bhutanese refugees, with unofficial estimates of the ethnic Bhutanese refugee population as high as 30 to 40%, constituting a majority in the south (about 242,000 people).

According to the 2011 Census of India, there were a total of 2,926,168 Nepali language speakers in India.

Nepali is the third-most spoken language in the Australian territory of Tasmania, where it is spoken by 1.3% of its population, and fifth-most spoken language in the Northern Territory, Australia, spoken by 1.3% of its population.

Literature

Nepali developed significant literature within a short period of a hundred years in the 19th century. This literary explosion was fuelled by Adhyatma Ramayana; Sundarananda Bara (1833); Birsikka, an anonymous collection of folk tales; and a version of the ancient Indian epic ''Ramayana'' by Bhanubhakta Acharya (d. 1868). The contribution of trio-laureates Lekhnath Paudyal, Laxmi Prasad Devkota, and Balkrishna Sama took Nepali to the level of other world languages. The contribution of expatriate writers outside Nepal, especially in Darjeeling and Varanasi in India, is also notable.

Dialects

Dialects of Nepali include Acchami, Baitadeli, Bajhangi, Bajurali, Bheri, Dadeldhuri, Dailekhi, Darchulali, Darchuli, Gandakeli, Humli, Purbeli, and Soradi. These dialects can be distinct from Standard Nepali. Mutual intelligibility between Baitadeli, Bajhangi, Bajurali (Bajura), Humli, and Acchami is low. The dialect of Nepali language spoken in Karnali Province is not mutually intelligible with Standard Nepali. The language is known with its old name as '' Khas Bhasa'' in Karnali.

Phonology

Vowels and consonants are outlined in the tables below.

Vowels

Nepali distinguishes six oral vowels and five nasal vowels. /o/ does not have a phonemic nasal counterpart, although it is often in free variation with �

Nepali has ten diphthongs: /ui̯/, /iu̯/, /ei̯/, /eu̯/, /oi̯/, /ou̯/, /ʌi̯/, /ʌu̯/, /ai̯/, and /au̯/.

Consonants

and are nonsyllabic allophones of and respectively. Every consonant except and /ɦ/ has a geminate counterpart between vowels. /ɳ/ and /ʃ/ also exist in some loanwords such as /baɳ/ "arrow" and /nareʃ/ "king", but these sounds are sometimes replaced with native Nepali phonemes.

Final schwas may or may not be preserved in speech. The following rules can be followed to figure out whether or not Nepali words retain the final schwa.

# Schwa is retained if the final syllable is a conjunct consonant. (, 'end'), (, 'relation'), (, 'greatest'/a last name).
Exceptions: conjuncts such as in (, 'stage') (, 'city') and occasionally the last name (/).
# For any verb form the final schwa is always retained unless the schwa-cancelling halanta is present. (, 'it happens'), (, 'in happening so; therefore'), (, 'he apparently went'), but (, 'they are'), (, 'she went'). Meanings may change with the wrong orthography: (, 'she didn't go') vs (, 'she went').
# Adverbs, onomatopoeia and postpositions usually maintain the schwa and if they don't, halanta is acquired: ( 'now'), (, 'towards'), (, 'today') ( 'drizzle') vs (, 'more').
# Few exceptional nouns retain the schwa such as: (, 'suffering'), (, 'pleasure').

Note: Schwas are often retained in music and poetry to facilitate singing and recitation.

Grammar

Nepali is a highly fusional language with relatively free word order, although the dominant arrangement is SOV (subject–object–verb). There are three major levels or gradations of honorifics: low, medium and high. Low honorific is used where no respect is due, medium honorific is used to signify equal status or neutrality, and high honorific signifies respect. There is also a separate highest level honorific, which was used to refer to members of the royal family, and by the royals among themselves. Like all modern Indo-Aryan languages, Nepali grammar has syncretized heavily, losing much of the complex declensional system present in the older languages. Instead, it relies heavily on periphrasis, a marginal verbal feature of older Indo-Aryan languages.

Writing system

Nepali is written in Devanagari script.

In the section below Nepali is represented in Latin transliteration using the IAST scheme and IPA. The chief features are: subscript dots for retroflex consonants; macrons for etymologically, contrastively long vowels; ''h'' denoting aspirated plosives. Tildes denote nasalised vowels.

Consonants

Vowels

Sample text

The following is a sample text in Nepali, of Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, with a transliteration (IAST) and transcription ( IPA).

; Nepali in Devanagari Script
: धारा १. सबै व्यक्तिहरू जन्मजात स्वतन्त्र हुन् ती सबैको समान अधिकार र महत्व छ। निजहरूमा विचार शक्ति र सद्विचार भएकोले निजहरूले आपसमा भातृत्वको भावनाबाट व्यवहार गर्नु पर्छ।

; Transliteration (ISO)
: Dhārā 1. Sabai vyaktiharū janmajāt svatantra hun tī sabaiko samān adhikār ra mahatva cha. Nijharūmā vicār śakti ra sadvicār bhaekole nijharūle āpasmā bhatṛtvako bhāvanabāṭa vyavahār garnu parcha.

; Transcription ( IPA)

: [dʱaɾa ek sʌbʌi̯ bektiɦʌɾu d͡zʌnmʌd͡zat sotʌntɾʌ ɦun ti sʌbʌi̯ko sʌman ʌd(ʱ)ikaɾ rʌ mʌːtːo t͡sʰʌ nid͡zɦʌɾuma bit͡saɾ sʌkti ɾʌ sʌdbit͡sar bʱʌekole nid͡zɦʌɾule apʌsma bʱatɾitːoko bʱawʌnabaʈʌ bebaːr ɡʌɾnu pʌɾt͡sʰʌ]

; Gloss (word-to-word)

: Article 1. All human-beings from-birth independent are their all equal right and importance is. In themselves, intellect and conscience they brotherhood's spirit do must.

; Translation (grammatical)

: Article 1. All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

See also

* Nepal Sambat
* Nepali language movement

References

Footnotes

Bibliography

*
*
*

Further reading

* , . . (2000), , , ।
* Schmidt, R. L. (1993
''A Practical Dictionary of Modern Nepali.''
* Turner, R. L. (1931
''A Comparative and Etymological Dictionary of the Nepali Language.''
* Clements, G.N. & Khatiwada, R. (2007). "Phonetic realization of contrastively aspirated affricates in Nepali." In ''Proceedings of ICPhS XVI'' (Saarbrücken, 6–10 August 2007), 629- 632

* Hutt, M. & Subedi, A. (2003) ''Teach Yourself Nepali.''
*
* Manders, C. J. (2007) '' A Foundation in Nepali Grammar.''
* Dr. Dashrath Kharel, "Nepali linguistics spoken in Darjeeling-Sikkim"

External links

* wikt:Nepali lemmas, List of Nepali words at Wiktionary, the free dictionary

Omniglot – Nepali Language

Barala – Easy Nepali Typing
* , Nepali Brihat Shabdakosh (Comprehensive Nepali Dictionary)
"Nepal Academy"
* , Nepali Brihat Shabdakosh – Nepali Dictionar

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nepali Language

Indo-Aryan languages
Languages of Assam
Languages of Bhutan
Languages of Nepal
Languages of Sikkim
Languages of West Bengal
Languages officially written in Indic scripts
Languages written in Devanagari
National symbols of Nepal
Official languages of India
Official languages of Nepal
Sahitya Akademi recognised languages
Lingua francas
Fusional languages
Standard languages
Subject–object–verb languages
Northern Indo-Aryan languages