culture

Origin of Punjabi Language, Literature and Culture

Language is not always a vehicle of communication and thought in the sub continent. It has been at the center of parochial and communal politics for long time. Region and relgion have often clouded our vision about language and culture and our approach has neither been rational nor open. Eminent historian Professor J.S. Grewal who has been vice chancellor of the Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar and Director of Indian Institute of Advanced Study Shimla, discusses origin of Punjabi language, literature and culture in this four-part series.  This is the first part.

The Rigveda contains words which are not found in the Indo-Iranian or the Indo-European languages. It is suggested, therefore, that these words come from the indigenous people of the region now known as the Punjab. Significantly, these words relate to agriculture which in the beginning was not known to the people of the Rigveda who inhabited the region in the second half of the second millennium BC. It is well known that much of the vocabulary of the language now known as Punjabi comes from Sanskrit, which can be traced to the Vedas. However, classical Sanskrit of Kalidas, or of the epics and the Puranas, was not exactly the same as the Vedic language. The famous grammarian, Panini, who lived close to the Indus in the sixth-fifth century BC, is regarded as the father of classical Sanskrit. It is more likely; therefore, that Sanskrit vocabulary in the Punjabi language was actually mediated through the north-western Prakrit which was close to but different from the Vedic language. It is suggested indeed that the Buddhist Milindapanho, which remained extant in Pali, was originally composed in the north-western Prakrit which was the spoken language of the people in the second half of the first millennium BC. The edicts of Ashoka, inscribed in Prakrit in the Brahmi script in the third century BC were supposed to be understandable to a much larger number of people than Sanskrit.

In the early 7th AD, when Yuan Chwang travelled through Gandhara, Taxila, Simhapura, Takka, Patti, Jalandhara, Sahrind, Thanesar and Sugh, even the Buddhist sages were composing and explaining Buddhist woks in Sanskrit. He had great appreciation for the language of the region around the capital of Harsha, but he had little good to say about the language current in other parts of the subcontinent. With reference to the peoples of India, he says:

“In language speaking generally, they have not varied from the original source, but the people of "Mid-India" are preeminently explicit and correct in speech, their expressions being harmonious and elegant, like those of the devas, and their intonation clear and distinct, serving as rule and pattern for others.”

Yuan Chwang is talking of Sanskrit, no doubt. But he goes on to add that the people of neighbouring territories had repeated errors until they became `the norm' so that `the pure style' was lost in `vulgarities'. The terms used by Yuan Chwang tend to suggest that the language of these other regions was far removed from classical Sanskrit. Indeed, in many parts of the subcontinent by the seventh century creative writers were composing their works in languages which the Sanskritists referred to as 'apbransh'. However, their writers referred to these languages as `desi'. They were farther removed from Sanskrit than Prakrits. Like Prakrits, however, they had regional variations so that it was reasonable to speak of the north-western apbransh or desi. In fact, there are references to a language called Takki. It is tempting to think that this language was associated with the region called Takka, between the rivers Indus and Beas.

Alberuni, who lived in Lahore and Multan in the early decades of the eleventh century, observed that `a classical' language was in use among the upper and educated classes. The language in use among the common people was 'a neglected vernacular'. Whereas classic is defined as 'of allowed excellence, cited as a model, often referred to, standard, having literary associations', vernacular is defined as `of one's own country, not of a foreign origin or learned formation'. During the 11th  and 12th  centuries the people of the region began to compose poetry in their own language and to narrate popular tales in prose. Mohan Singh Diwana (Oberoi) ascribes the earliest known poetry of the region to Gorakhnathi Jogis. We are not sure that the poetry actually ascribed to the Jogis has come down from the eleventh or twelfth century but we are sure that the Gorakhnathi movement was well on its way by the twelfth century and that the Jogis had no objection to admitting low caste people to their order. Possibly, therefore, they could think of addressing the common people in their own language.

This was certainly true of Farid, the eminent Sufi Shaikh of the thirteenth century. His message was universal: it was meant for all, irrespective of caste or gender. As Sant Singh Sekhon points out, the maturity of Farid's poetry indicates that he could not be the first poet to use the language of the Multan region for creative purposes. Shaikh Farid enriched the culture of the region not only by using the language of the people as the medium of expression and communication but also by using metaphors from their physical, material, and social environment. In this process Sufi ideas and attitudes, which were otherwise more or less foreign to the region, became indigenized.

In the late thirteenth-early fourteenth century Amir Khusrau observed that the people of the region around Lahore spoke a language that was distinct from Persian as well as Sanskrit and they used it for their day to day purposes. Khusrau does not refer to any creative use of the language he calls Lahauri but we may be sure that Vars had begun to be composed by this time to be sung by dhadis. The themes of these Vars were generally war and love. In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, peoples' languages began to be used for popular expression in different parts of the subcontinent. In this context, Guru Nanak used the language of the people of his region to make it clearly a literary language. His sixteenth-century successors made use of peoples' language, and Guru Arjan compiled a Granth in the opening decade of the seventeenth century. Till today it remains the single most important volume of peoples' literature Shah Husain used the language of the region of Lahore on a scale larger than that of Shaikh Farid and his example was followed by other Sufi poets of the region till the late nineteenth century. Thus, it is clear that the language of the region became a literary language as the result mainly of the religious movements known as the Gorakhnathi yoga, Sufi Islam, and Sikhism, in the ascending order of importance. [To be continued]