Kishtwari or Kashtwari is an Indo-Aryan language closely related to the

Kashmiri language Kashmiri ( ) or Koshur (Kashmiri: , , ) is an Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan language of the Dardic languages, Dardic branch spoken by around 7 million Kashmiris of the Kashmir region, primarily in the Kashmir Valley and surrounding hills o ...

, with strong influences from neighbouring

Western Pahari The Western Pahari languages are a range of languages and dialects of Northern Indo-Aryan languages spoken in the western parts of the Himalayan range, primarily in the Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. They are also spoken in Jammu and Jaunsar ...

varieties. It is spoken by Hindus in

Kishtwar district Kishtwar district is an administrative district of the Jammu division of Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir of the disputed Kashmir region.The application of the term "administered" to the various regions of Kashmir and a mention of the ...

Jammu division The Jammu division (; ) is a Divisions of India, revenue and administrative division of the Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir (union territory), Jammu and Kashmir in the disputed Kashmir region.The application of the term "administered" to t ...

in Jammu and Kashmir,

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

. Like Kashmiri, Kishtwari is also a language, though George Abraham Grierson has called Kishtwari a dialect of Kashmiri. He has not studied Kishtwari and its dialects. He seems to have been influenced by Kishtwari-Kashmiri, spoken by Muslims of Kishtwar and its spectacular resemblance with Kashmiri which is not pure Kashmiri but has close affinity to the Kashmiri of the valley. So Kishtwari-Kashmiri is a dialect of Kashmiri.

Origin

Kishtwari originated from

Prakrit Prakrit ( ) is a group of vernacular classical Middle Indo-Aryan languages that were used in the Indian subcontinent from around the 5th century BCE to the 12th century CE. The term Prakrit is usually applied to the middle period of Middle Ind ...

– the spoken language of common people in ancient times. The literary language was

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...

which has a close relationship with

. It can be conveniently called a sister language of the

, as both have originated from

which is much simpler than

. Kishtwari has been preserved from the admixture of words and phrases from other languages and dialects. However, the original Prakrit spoken by common man of Kishtwar in olden times has absorbed some words from Dogri, Punjabi, and

Persian language Persian ( ), also known by its endonym and exonym, endonym Farsi (, Fārsī ), is a Western Iranian languages, Western Iranian language belonging to the Iranian languages, Iranian branch of the Indo-Iranian languages, Indo-Iranian subdivision ...

s to a limited extent. The present form of Kishtwari is directly descended from Prakrit, Pali or Sanskrit.

Classification

Grierson, in his

Linguistic Survey of India The Linguistic Survey of India (LSI) is a comprehensive survey of the languages of British India, describing 364 languages and dialects. The Survey was first proposed by George Abraham Grierson, a member of the Indian Civil Service and a lingu ...

, classified Kishtwari as a highly divergent variety of Kashmiri that had been profoundly influenced by neighbouring Punjabi and Western Pahari languages. Grierson noted that Kishtwari is more conservative in certain aspects than other Kashmiri dialects, as evidenced by the retention of subject pronoun ''thu'', in addition to the

present participle In linguistics, a participle (; abbr. ) is a nonfinite verb form that has some of the characteristics and functions of both verbs and adjectives. More narrowly, ''participle'' has been defined as "a word derived from a verb and used as an adject ...

''an'', features that have disappeared in Standard Kashmiri. A wordlist and preliminary grammatical sketch of Kishtwari were compiled in ''The Languages of the Northern Himalayas''. Kishtwari has historically been classified as a dialect of Kashmiri by scholars such as George Abraham Grierson, and is partially intelligible with Kashmiri. Linguists like Siddheshwar Varma consider Kishtwari an intermediate between Western Pahari languages and Kashmiri. If considered a divergent dialect of Kashmiri, Kishtwari is one of two Kashmiri varieties spoken outside of the

Kashmir Valley The Kashmir Valley, also known as the Vale of Kashmir, is an intermontane valley in northern Jammu and Kashmir, a region in Indian-administered Kashmir.(a) (subscription required) Quote: "Kashmir, region of the northwestern Indian subcont ...

(the other being Poguli, which is even more distinct and not intelligible with either Kashmiri or Kishtwari). Kishtwari is also tonal, like neighbouring languages such as Dogri and Punjabi.

Number of speakers

The 1911 Census of India recorded 7,464 speakers of Kishtwari.

Script

Grierson remarks that an idiosyncratic variant of

Takri The Tākri script (Takri (Chamba district, Chamba): ; Takri (Jammu Division, Jammu/Dogri script, Dogra): ; sometimes called Tankri ) is an abugida writing system of the Brahmic scripts, Brahmic family of scripts. It is derived from the Sharada ...

is used to write the Kishtwari language; as well as observing that there does not appear to be standard spelling nor a consistent orthography. Kashtwari

References

{{Languages of Jammu and Kashmir Indo-Aryan languages Kashmiri language Kishtwar district Languages of Jammu and Kashmir