Awadhi language

Awadhi is predominantly spoken in the Awadh region encompassing central Uttar Pradesh, along with the lower part of the Ganga-Yamuna doab.[4][9] In the west, it is bounded by Western Hindi, specifically Kannauji and Bundeli, while in the east there is the Bihari dialect Bhojpuri. In the north, it is bounded by the country of Nepal and in the south by Bagheli, which shares a great resemblance with Awadhi.[10]

The districts of Lakhimpur Kheri, Sitapur, Lucknow, Unnao, and Fatehpur form the western parts of the Awadhi-speaking area. The central districts include Barabanki, Rae Bareli, Amethi, and Baharich. The eastern parts include districts of Faizabad, Allahabad, Kaushambi, Gonda, Basti, Sultanpur, Ambedkar Nagar, and Pratapgarh. It is also spoken in some parts of Mirzapur, Azamgarh and Jaunpur districts.[9]

Awadhi speaking districts in Uttar Pradesh, India.

Awadhi is spoken in these parts of Nepal: Bheri zone: Banke and Bardia districts; Lumbini zone: Kapilvastu, Nawalparasi, and Rupandehi districts; Mahakali zone: Kanchanpur district; Rapti zone: Dang district; Seti zone: Kailali district.[11]

A language influenced by Awadhi (as well as other languages) is also spoken as a lingua franca for Indians in Fiji and is referred to as Fijian Hindi. According to Ethnologue, it is a type of Awadhi influenced by Bhojpuri and is also classified as Eastern-Hindi.[12] Another language influenced by Awadhi (and Bhojpuri) is Caribbean Hindustani, spoken by Indians in the Caribbean countries of Trinidad and Tobago, Suriname, and Guyana. The Hindustani that is spoken in South Africa and Mauritius is also partly influenced by Awadhi.These forms of Awadhi are also spoken by the diaspora in North America, Europe, and Oceania.

Awadhi possesses both voiced and voiceless vowels. The voiced vowels are: /ʌ/, /aː/, /ɪ/, /iː/, /ʊ/, /uː/, /e/, /eː/, /o/, /oː/.[15] The voiceless vowels, also described as "whispered vowels" are: /i̥/, /ʊ̥/, /e̥/.[16]

Awadhi has many features that separate it from the neighboring Western Hindi and Bihari vernaculars. In Awadhi, nouns are generally both short and long, where Western Hindi has generally short while Bihari generally employs longer and long forms. The gender is rigorously maintained in Western Hindi, Awadhi is a little loose yet largely preserved, while Bihari is highly attenuated. Regarding to postpositions, Awadhi is distinguished from Western Hindi by the absence of agentive postposition in the former, agreeing with Bihari dialects. The accusative-dative postposition in Awadhi is /kaː/ or /kə/ while Western Hindi has /koː/ or /kɔː/ and Bihari has /keː/. The locative postposition in both Bihari and Western Hindi is /mẽː/ while Awadhi has /maː/. The pronouns in Awadhi have /toːɾ-/, /moːɾ-/ as personal genitives while /teːɾ-/, /meːɾ-/ are used in Western Hindi. The oblique of /ɦəmaːɾ/ is /ɦəmɾeː/ in Awadhi while it is /ɦəmaːɾeː/ in Western Hindi and /ɦəmrən'kæ/ in Bihari.[6]

Another defining characteristic of Awadhi is the affix /-ɪs/ as in /dɪɦɪs/, /maːɾɪs/ etc. The neighbouring Bhojpuri has the distinctive (i) /laː/ enclitic in present tense (ii) /-l/ in past tense (iii) dative postposition /-laː/ which separates it from the Awadhi language.[13]

Notes:

^* indicates a form inflectable for gender and number :

1. mor → mōrā (masculine), mōrī (feminine), mōrē (plural)
2. hamār → hamrā (masc.), hamrī (fem.), hamrē (pl.)
3. tōr→ torā (masc.), torī (fem.), torē (pl.)
4. tumar→ tumrā (masc.), tumrī (fem.), tumrē (pl.)
5. tohār→ tohrā (masc.), tohrī (fem.), tohrē (pl.)

In this period, Awadhi became the vehicle for epic poetry in northern India.[20] Its literature is mainly divided into: bhaktīkāvya (devotional poetry) and premākhyān (romantic tales).

The most important work, probably in any modern Indo-Aryan language, came from the poet-saint Tulsidas in the form of Ramcharitmanas (1575 C.E.) or "The Lake of the Deeds of Rama", written in doha-chaupai metre. Its plot is mostly derivative, either from the original Rāmāyaṇa by Valmiki or from the Adhyātma Rāmāyaṇa, both of which are in Sanskrit.[21] Mahatma Gandhi had acclaimed the Ramchairtmanas as "the greatest book of all devotional literature" while western observers have christened it as "the Bible of Northern India".[22] It is sometimes synonymously referred as 'Tulsidas Ramayana' or simply 'the Ramayana'.[23]

Illustrations to the Ramcharitmanas of Tulsidas

(a) Death of Vali: Rama and Lakshmana Wait Out the Monsoon, (b) Rama’s Army Crossing the Ocean to Lanka.

Tulsidas's compositions Hanuman Chalisa,[24][25][26] Pārvatī Maṅgala and Jānakī Maṅgala are also written in Awadhi.[27]

The first Hindi vernacular adaptation of the 'Dasam Skandha' of the Bhagavata Purana, the “Haricharit” by Lalachdas, who hailed from Hastigram (present-day Hathgaon near Rae Bareilly), was concluded in 1530 C.E. It circulated widely for a long time and scores of manuscript copies of the text have been found as far as eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, Malwa and Gujarat, all written in the Kaithi script.[30]

Satyavatī (ca. 1501) of Ishvaradas (of Delhi) under the reign of Sikander Lodi and Avadhabilāsa (1700 C.E.) of Laladas were also written in Awadhi.

Awadhi appeared as a major component in the works of Bhakti saints like Kabir, who used a language often described as being a pancmel khicṛī or "a hotch-potch" of several vernaculars.[31][32] The language of Kabir's major work Bijak is primarily Awadhi.[33][34]

Illustrations to Awadhi Sufi texts

Queen Nagamati talks to her parrot, Padmavat, 1750 C.E.

Lovers shoot at a tiger in the jungle. From the mystical Sufi text Madhumalati.

Awadhi also emerged as the favorite literary language of the Eastern Sufis from the last quarter of the 14th century onwards. It became the language of premākhyāns, romantic tales built on the pattern of Persian masnavi, steeped in Sufi mysticism but set in a purely Indian background, with a large number of motifs directly borrowed from Indian lore. The first of such premākhyān in the Awadhi language was Candāyan (1379 C.E.) of Maulana Da'ud.[35] The tradition was carried forward by Jayasi, whose masterpiece, the Padmāvat (1540 C.E.) was composed under the reign of the famous ruler Sher Shah Suri. The Padmavat travelled far and wide, from Arakan to the Deccan, and was eagerly copied and retold in Persian and other languages.[36]

Other prominent works of Jayasi—Kānhāvat,[37] Akhrāvaṭ[27] and Ākhrī Kalām[38] are also written in Awadhi.

I’ll tell you about my great town, the ever-beautiful Jais.

In the satyayuga it was a holy place, then it was called the “Town of Gardens.”
Then the treta went, and when the dvapara came, there was a great rishi called Bhunjaraja.
88,000 rishis lived here then, and dense … and eighty-four ponds.
They baked bricks to make solid ghats, and dug eight-four wells.
Here and there they built handsome forts, at night they looked like stars in the sky.
They also put up several orchards with temples on top.

Doha: They sat there doing tapas, all those human avataras.They crossed this world doing homa and japa day and night.

— Jayasi, Kanhavat, ed. Pathak (8), 7-8.[39]

The Awadhi romance Mirigāvatī (ca.1503) or "The Magic Doe", was written by Shaikh 'Qutban' Suhravardi, who was an expert and storyteller attached to the court-in-exile of Sultan Hussain Shah Sharqi of Jaunpur.[40][41] Another romance named Madhumālatī or "Night Flowering Jasmine" by poet Sayyid Manjhan Rajgiri was written in 1545 C.E.[42]

Amir Khusrau (d. 1379 C.E) is also said to have written some compositions in Awadhi.[43]

The most significant contributions to the Awadhi literature in the modern period have come from writers like Ramai Kaka (1915-1982 C.E.), Balbhadra Prasad Dikshit better known as ‘Padhees’(1898-1943 C.E.) and Vanshidhar Shukla (1904-1980 C.E.).

‘Krishnayan’ (1942 C.E.) is a major Awadhi epic-poem that Dwarka Prasad Mishra wrote in imprisonment during the Freedom Movement of India.

The 1961 film Gunga Jumna features Awadhi being spoken by the characters in a neutralised form. In the 2001 film Lagaan, a neutralised form of Awadhi language was used to make it understandable to audiences.[44][45] The 2009 film Dev.D features an Awadhi song, "Paayaliya", composed by Amit Trivedi.[46] In the television series Yudh, Amitabh Bachchan spoke parts of his dialogue in Awadhi, which received critical acclaim from the Hindustan Times.[47] Awadhi is also spoken by the residents of Ayodhya and other minor characters in Ramanand Sagar's 1987 television series Ramayan.

The genres of folklore sung in Awadh include Sohar, Sariya, Byaah, Suhag, Gaari, Nakta, Banraa (Banna-Banni), Alha, Sawan, Jhula, Hori, Barahmasa, and Kajri.[48]