Malayalam language

:Note: Malayalam is not the Malay language, which is spoken in Malaysia.

Evolution

With Tamil, Kota, Kodagu and Kannada, Malayalam belongs to the southern group of Dravidian languages. Its affinity to Tamil is the most striking. Proto-Tamil Malayalam, the common stock of Tamil and Malayalam apparently disintegrated over a period of four of five centuries from the ninth century on, resulting in the emergence of Malayalam as a language distinct from Tamil. As the language of scholarship and administration Tamil greatly influenced the early development of Malayalam. So much so, Malayalam is said to be the younger sister of Tamil. Later the irresistible inroads the Namboothiris made into the cultural life of Kerala accelerated the assimilation of many Indo-Aryan features into Malayalam at different levels.

Related Topics:
Tamil - Kodagu - Kannada - Namboothiri - Indo-Aryan

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Kerala and Lakshadweep Islands are the only place in world where Malayalam is the main spoken language.

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Malayalam colloquial grammar is available at http://www.geocities.com/malayalamgrammar

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