This list is instructive in two points. In the first place it shows that the Dravidian languages -- Tamil, Telugu, Kanarese, and so forth -- were not yet recognized as a separate family. That had to await the acute discernment of Hodgson. Here they are looked upon as being just as much Sanskritic as Bengali or Hindi. The other point is that no distinction has been made between language and dialect. We find great languages, -- like Burmese, Bengali, or Pashto -- side by side with forms of speech like Jaipuri and Harauti, which are hardy separate dialects -- certainly less so than the dialect of Somerset and that of Devonshire. This is due to the fact that, at least in NorthernIndia, there is no word exactly corresponding to our ` language,' as distinct from ` dialect.' All that the average Indian recognizes is dialect. Unless taught by European methods, he has no word for denoting a group of cognate dialects under one general head. He has numerous (hundreds of) dialect names, just as we talk of the Somersetshire and Yorkshire dialects, but no word parallel to our general term, ` English.'

by the name of Namsangias, but also called JaipuriaNagas after the name of the village through which they mostly descend to the plains. We know more about their language than we do about any others of the EasternSub-Group, for Robinson published a grammar and vocabulary of it in the year 1849. Owen, Hodgson, Peal, Sir GeorgeCampbell, and Butler have also given us more or less extended lists of words. Since then nothing seems to have been done regarding them. Indeed at

possessing peculiarities of its own. Nimadi can, however, hardly be called a true dialect, in the sense in which we call Marwari, Jaipuri, Mewati, and Malvi dialects of Rajasthani. It is rather a mixed patois made up of several languages, with Malvi for its basis.

of late years a survey of these chronicles has been undertaken by the Asiatic Society of Bengal, under the auspices of the Government of India, and considerable progress had been made in cataloguing them and in publishing texts, when the work was interrupted by the lamented death of Dr. L. P. Tessitori, the learned Italian scholar in whose immediate charge it was. Since then the project has been in abeyance. The most important chronicle of all, the PrithirajRasau of ChandBardai, has also lately been made available to students by the publication, under the care of the NagariPrachariniSabha of Benares, of the complete text with an abstract in Hindi. A few episodes of it have also been translated into English by Beames and by Hoernle. It is written in an old form of western Hindi -- not in Rajasthani -- also used by Rajput bards for poetical purposes, and known as Pingal, and, as we have it now, probably contains spurious additions ; but it is nevertheless a wonderful storehouse of Rajputana history and legend. The Serampore Missionaries translated the New Testament into Harauti (a CentralEastern dialect), Ujaini (i.e., Malvi), Udaipuri (i.e., Mowari, a form of Marwari), Marwari, Jaipuri, and Bikaneri (another form of Marwari).

The Namsangia, or Jaipuria, as they are also called, have probably about thirty villages, with a population of 25,000, or 30,000. They are the last Naga tribe of importance to the east, though there are a few broken tribes still further to the east of them; these are of little note, and are in subjection to the Singpho.

The Namsangias live across the eastern border of the Sibsagar District. Their headquarters are the village of Jaipur, and the banks of the Namsang River in its neighbourhood, at the south-west corner of Lakhimpur, where it abuts on Sibsagar. They are also known by the name of JaipuriaNagas after their principal village. Brown classes their language as identical with Borduaria and Paniduaria, but these are the names of two septs of the Mohongia tribe, some eight miles to their west. Mohongia is, so far as I can tell from the scanty materials available, not the same as Namsangia.1

BUTLER, Captain J., -- A Rough Comparative Vocabulary of two more of the Dialects spoken in the ` Naga Hills.' Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Vol. xliv, 1875, Part I, pp. 216 and ff. Contains a Vocabulary of ` JaipuriaNaga.'

In Bharatpur and in the Dang dialects to its south, which lie to the west of Karauli, the y is preserved, and au is sometimes changed to o and sometimes not. Here we have the language fading off into the Jaipuri dialect of Rajasthani in which the y exists, but the termination is always o , not au . Similarly in Gurgaon, the dialect is fading off into Mewati, and here again the au has become o , but the y is preserved. Finally in the TaraiParganas of NainiTal, we find a mongrel dialect, locally known as Bhuksa , from one of the tribes which employ it. I have classed it as BrajBhakha, but it might with equal propriety be put under Kanauji or Hindostani.

presents many notable peculiarities. These are described in the section relating to those dialects. Suffice it to say here that they form a connecting link between BrajBhakha and the Jaipuri dialect of Rajasthani. Like many rude forms of speech they are of importance for the comparative philology of the modern Indo-Aryan vernaculars.

The State of Karauli consists partly of plains country, and partly, on the north, south, and east, of broken hill country, known as the Dang. In the Dang we find a number of broken dialects, mixtures of BrajBhakha and Jaipuri which will be discussed later on (vide pp. 329 ff.). The plains country is inhabited mainly by Rajputs of the Yadava or Jado tribe. This tribe also extends across the Chambal into the Gwalior State, where it occupies the district of Sabalgarh, and the north of the district of Shiopur. Over the whole of the tract in which these Yadavas dwell, the local dialect is known as Jadobati. This is good BrajBhakha, purer even than in Dholpur immediately to its north, for it preserves the y in the past tense. A few lines of the Parable will make this clear.

The word lahurau , younger, is contracted to lhaurau , which is also common in the Dangs, and in Jaipuri. Bhethani (literally, in that place) is used to mean ` there.' This too occurs in the Dangs, where we have also bhya and mha in the same meaning.

To the south of BrajBhakha lie the Mewati and Jaipuri dialects of Rajasthani, into both of which it gradually merges. In Gurgaon we see it becoming Mewati. In the State of Bharatpur we notice the first signs of the influence of Jaipuri, which becomes stronger as we go south, until in the Dangs, or broken country in the south of that State, in Karauli, and in the east of Jaipur, we find a number of sub-dialects which are grouped together under the name of Dangi. The number of speakers of these intermediate forms of BrajBhakha are reported to be as follows : -- Gurgaon

We shall see, in dealing with Jaipuri, that this very termination can also be added to words, but here it is recognised as a distinct enclitic word, not as verbal terminations, and can be added or not at will. Thus, gayo or gayo-s , he went (it will be noticed that the same peculiarity occurs in BanaphariBundeli, vide post, p. 485).

In the State of Karauli, Dangi is reported to be spoken by 60,000 people. Here it is a rude BrajBhakha, with a strange vocabulary, and various infusions of Jaipuri. Two specimens are given, -- a portion of the Parable of the Prodigal Son, and a letter written in the locality, given just as it was put down, except that the formal salutation at the commencement has been omitted. The following are the principal divergencies from Standard BrajBhakha which should be noted.

The Dangi proper of Jaipur is spoken in the north-west corner of the state on the borders of Bharatpur and Karauli. It is continuous with the Dangi of the former state. To the west of the Dangi proper, along the southern border of Alwar, there is a mixed dialect, through which Dangi shades off into Jaipuri. It may also be included under the head of Dangi. The number of speakers is reported to be as follows : -- Dangi proper

As a rule strong masculine nouns (as distinct from adjectives, and (participles) end in a , not o . The termination o is Jaipuri and is occasionally met with. Now and then we meet u , thus, sonu , gold ; janu , a person. Of nouns of this class, the oblique

singular as well as the nominative plural ends either in e , as in BrajBhakha, or in a , as in Jaipuri. Nouns in a have only the form in a . Thus, pota , a grandson ; accusative pota-ku , nom. plur. pota ; ghora , a horse or horses. The other nouns seem to prefer e . Thus, from rahabe-walo (or -waro ), a dweller, we have as genitive rahabewale-ko , and from janu , oblique jane . The oblique plural of all these nouns ends in an or en , as in potan-ku or poten-ku , to grandsons.

The genitive of ap , self, is ap-ko or apano . The word is sometimes (as in Jaipuri) used to mean ` we.' Quite frequently, the personal pronouns mero , wa-ko , etc., are used where, according to the rules of BrajBhakha, we should expect apano .

The form of the conjunctive participle is borrowed from Jaipuri, and is noteworthy. Its typical sign is the letter r , as in bolar , bolar-kai , bolar-kain , or bolar-kain , having said. Sometimes the termination is ir instead of ar , as in uthir or uthar , having arisen. The termination ar is often written as a separate word and is hence liable to confusion with the word ar , and. Thus, charar , having mounted, is written both {NN} and {NN] {NN}

Dangbhang is more infected with Jaipuri idioms than Dangi. It even exhibits modes of expression which have hitherto been considered to be peculiar to Gujarati. In its grammatical forms the following are the main points in which it differs from Dangi of Jaipur.

As to pronouns, the first person is the same as in Dangi, except that we now and then meet a Jaipuri form, such as mharo , as well as mero/>, my. The accusative-dativesmoya , toya , waya , etc., do not occur.

In Jaipur the word dugar means ` a hill,' and hence Dugar-wara means the language of the hill country. It is spoken by 108,766 people, south-west of Dangi, and immediately to the north-west of Kalimal. It only differs from the latter dialect in being more strongly infected with Jaipuri. In fact it could with equal propriety be classed as a form of that language. The main points in which it differs from Kalimal are that it is fond of using the suffix of kai-tai to represent the dative case ; ` your' is thamaro ; and ` who?' is kun . In the verb substantive it prefers the Jaipuri forms chhu (present) and chho (past) to hu and ho , and the verb is conjugated in the plural sometimes like Dangi, and sometimes like Jaipuri.

of the Rajputs. The name, as connoting a language, has been invented for the purposes of this Survey, in order to distinguish it from Western Hindi on the one hand, and from Gujarati on the other. Europeans have hitherto included the various dialects under the loose term of ` Hindi,' just as they have also used that name for Bihari and for the EasternHindi of Oudh. Natives do not employ any general name for the language, but content themselves with referring to the various dialects, Marwari, Jaipuri, Malvi, and so forth. Rajasthani is spoken by an estimated number of more than fifteen millions of people, and covers an area which may be roughly estimated at 180,000 square miles. The number of speakers is that estimated in the returns made for this Survey, which were based on the returns of the Census of 1891. The figures for Rajasthani in the Census for 1901 are much less, -- i.e., 10,917,712. The difference is no doubt due to the uncertain line which lies between Rajasthani and Western Hindi, and between Rajasthani and Sindhi. In 1891 many speakers of Western Hindi and Sindhi were included in the figures which were, for the Survey, interpreted as representing Rajasthani. On the other hand, a large reduction was to be expected in 1901, owing to the lamentable famines which have prevailed in the preceding decade over the area in which Rajasthani is spoken. The figures for 1901, therefore, though more accurate for the time at which they were recorded, cannot be taken as representing the normal number of persons who might be expected to speak this language. This I am inclined to put down at about twelve millions. As, however, the whole of the Linguistic Survey is founded on estimates which are derived from the figures of the Census of 1891, I am compelled to adhere to the larger estimated total in the following pages. No other figures which give the necessary details are available. The totals given must therefore be received with great reserve. We may compare the estimated number of speakers, and the area in which Rajasthani is spoken with the population and area of Spain, which are, in each case, a little larger.1

and the North-West of the Jaipur State. The area occupied by Marwari is greater than that occupied by all the other Rajasthani dialects put together. The Central-East Dialect is recognised under two well-known names, Jaipuri and Harauti, and there are other varieties as well. We may take the language of Jaipur as the Standard. Jaipuri, although in the East of Rajputana, is more nearly allied to Gujarati than is Marwari, the latter dialect tending rather to agree with the Sindhi, immediately to its west. North-EasternRajasthani includes the Mewati of Alwar, Bharatpur, and Gurgaon, and the Ahirwati of the Ahir country south and south-west of Delhi. It is the form of Rajasthani which agrees most closely with Western Hindi, -- the purest representative of the Central Group -- and some people maintain that it is a dialect of that language and not of Rajasthani. It is admittedly an intermediate form of speech, and the point is not one of great importance, but in my opinion it must be classed under the latter language. The principal South-Eastern dialect is the Malvi, spoken in Malwa and the adjoining country. It has Bundeli (a Western Hindi dialect) to its east and Gujarati to its west, and is really an intermediate form of speech between the two. It is hence less decisively marked by typical peculiarities of Rajasthani than Jaipuri, possessing some forms which are evidently connected with those of Western Hindi. The other South-Eastern dialect is Nimadi. It is by origin a form of Malvi, but is spoken in a rather isolated position amongst a number of non-Aryan hill tribes. It has hence been so affected by the influence of the neighbouring Bhili and Khandesi that it is now a distinct dialect, with marked peculiarities of its own.

yet been studied. Besides this, there is an enormous mass of literature in various forms of Rajasthani, of considerable historical importance, about which hardly anything is known. I allude to the corpus of bardic histories described in Tod'sRajasthan , the accomplished author of which was probably the only European who has read any considerable portion of them. A small fraction of the most celebrated history, the PrithrajRasau of ChandBardai, has, it is true, been edited and translated, but the rest, written in an obsolete form of a language little known at the present day, still remains a virgin mine for the student of history and of language. The task of producing the whole is, however, too gigantic for any single hand, and unless it is taken up by some body of scholars acting on a uniform plan, I fear that the only students of Rajputana history for many years to come will be fish-insects and white-ants. Besides these Bardic Chronicles Rajasthanl also possesses a large religious literature. That of the DaduPanthi sect alone contains more than half a million verses. We do not know in what dialect of Rajasthani any of these works are written. The portion of the PrithirajRasau which has been published is written in an old form of Western Hindi, -- not Rajasthani, -- but, unfortunately, this work, while the most celebrated, is also the one regarding the authenticity of which the most serious doubts are justified. The Serampur missionaries translated the New Testament into Marwari, Udaipuri (i.e., Mewari), Bikaneri (a form of Marwari), Jaipuri proper, Harauti (an Eastern dialect), and Ujaini (i, e., Malvi).

It will be observed that the conjugational roots used are those which are common to the languages of other parts of India. The Mewatisu is, of course, only a phonetic spelling of the Jaipurichhu . The conjugational forms are the same as those which

Note that in Malvi and Marwari the singular terminations are ga and la respectively, not go and to as we should expect. Unlike the go of Mewati and Marwari and the lo of Jaipuri, ga and la are immutable. They do not change for gender or number. They are no longer adjectives, and are hence to be distinguished from the ga of Standard Hindi.

(d) The Periphrastic Present . -- This is the ordinary present with which we are familiar in Hindostani. In that language, as in Braj and Buudeli, it is formed by conjugating the present tense of the verb substantive with the present participle. Thus, maichalatahu , ` I am going.' In Rajasthani, instead of the present participle being used, the simple present is conjugated together with the verb substantive. The same idiom is used in Gujarati. Thus, to take Jaipuri as an example, we have --

(e) The Imperfect. -- The usual way of forming the imperfect in Rajasthani is to add the past tense of the verb substantive to an oblique verbal noun in ai , which does not change for gender, number or person. Thus we have in Jaipurimaichalaichho , I was going, literally, I was on going, or as was said in old English ` I was a-going.' A similar idiom is heard in the Upper GangeticDoab, where it has probably been borrowed from Rajasthani. The line of borrowing is quite traceable. Malvi alone does not employ this idiom, but uses the present participle as in ordinary Western Hindi and Gujarati. The present participle may also be optionally used in Marwari. We thus obtain the following forms of the imperfect: --

is ko , while in Standard Marwai it is ro . In Jaipuri, the verb substantive is chhu , I am, chho , was ; in Marwari it is hu , I am, ho , was. In Jaipuri, there are two forms of the future. Of one the typical letter is s , as in marasyu , I shall strike. The other takes the suffix lo , which changes for gender and number ; thus, maru-lo , I shall strike. In Marwaii, there are three forms. In one of these, the typical letter is h , as in marahu , I shall strike. In another la is added, which does not change for gender or number, as in maru-la , I shall strike ; while the third adds go , like the Hindiga .

The Marwaris are a great mercantile community, and there are few parts of India where some of them may not be found carrying on the banking business of the country. No complete materials are at hand to show the number of speakers of their language away from their home. The following incomplete statistics are compiled from the Census figures of 1891. It will be seen that for several provinces figures are not available. Moreover, even where figures are given, these should be received with some suspicion, for there is no doubt that many speakers of other dialects of Rajasthani, such as Jaipuri or Malvi, have been included under Marwari.

Jaipuri, Ajmeri, Kishangarhi, and Harauti. So old and firmly established are these distinctions that the Serampore Missionaries in the beginning of the 18th century made separate translations of the New Testament into Jaipuri and Harauti. And yet all these four forms of speech differ so slightly that they are really one dialect which can be named EasternRajasthani. Over the whole area, which is clearly shown in the map facing p. 1, the language varies slightly from place to place, as is usual in the plains of India, but such local differences are too unimportant to justify us in allowing them to create separate dialects. Of the four, Jaipuri is the most important and may be taken as typical of the rest.