Manipravalam

Manipravalam മണിപ്രവാളം (Macaronic) was a literary style used in medieval liturgical texts in South India,[1] which used an admixture of Sanskrit and Adi Bhasha Malayalam.[2][3][4] Mani-pravalam literally means ruby-coral, where Mani means ruby in Adi Malayalam while Pravalam means Coral in Sanskrit.[5] Malayalam is referred to as ruby and Sanskrit as coral.[4]

Native words and grammatical endings were written using Adi Malayalam, and Sanskrit words were written using Grantha script.

Leelathilakam, a work on grammar and rhetoric, written in the last quarter of the 14th century in Kerala, discusses the relationship between Manipravalam and Sangeetham as poetic forms. It lays special emphasis on the types of words that blend harmoniously. It points out that the rules of Sanskrit prosody should be followed in Manipravalam poetry. This particular school of poetry was patronized by the upper classes, especially the Nambudiris.

Dramatic performances given in Koothambalams, known by the names of Koothu and Koodiyattam, often used Sanskrit and Adi Malayalam. In Koodiyattam, the clown (vidooshaka) is allowed to use Malayalam while the hero recites slokas in Sanskrit. Tholan, a legendary court poet in the period of the Kulasekhara kings, is believed to have started this practice. The language of Kramadeepikas and Attaprakarams, which lay down the rules and regulations for these dramatic performances, is considerably influenced by the composite literary dialect of Manipravalam. Various hagiographies on the life of the Vaishnava saint Ramanuja were in manipravalam.

Effect on the history of the Malayalam script

It is suggested that the advent of the Manipravalam style, where letters of the Grantha script coexisted with the traditional Vatteluttu letters, made it easier for people in Kerala to accept a Grantha-based script Ārya eḻuttŭ, and paved the way for the introduction of the new writing system.[6] Eventually Vaṭṭeḻuttŭ was almost completely supplanted by Ārya eḻuttŭ, that is, the modern Malayalam script.

See also

References

  1. ↑ "When Malayalam met Sanskrit, many centuries ago".
  2. ↑ The Illustrated weekly of India, (1965). Volume 86. Bennett, Coleman & Co., Ltd. pp. 35-37
  3. ↑ Blackburn, Stuart (2006). Print, folklore, and nationalism in colonial South India. New York, Springer. p. 29. After about AD 1500, translations from Sanskrit did appear, and unassimilated words began to flood literary Tamil; eventually a hybrid idiom (manipravalam) mixing Sanskrit and Tamil words, and Sanskrit words with Tamil inflections, was devised
  4. 1 2 Manipravalam Archived 2011-06-10 at the Wayback Machine. The Information & Public Relations Department, Government of Kerala.
  5. ↑ Ke Rāmacandr̲an Nāyar (1971). Early Manipravalam: a study. Anjali. Foreign Language Study. pp.78
  6. ↑ "Alphabets". Government of Kerala. Archived from the original on 2009-11-09. Retrieved 2009-10-31.

Further reading

  • Malayalam - From God's Own Country, Bhasha Ind
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.