The Indo Aryan Languages

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The INDO- ARYAN LANGUAGES (Origin and Groups) Introduction:- The roots of the oldest text of India, the Rig-Veda, have been discussed ever since a close linguistic relation between the North Indian and European languages was discovered at the beginning of the 19th century. This connection goes back to their common ancestor, the pre historic Proto- Indo- European (PIE) language. The closely related Old Iranian and Old Indo Aryan (Vedic) languages can be traced back to an Indo-Iranian (IIr) ancestor, one of the several branches of PIE. Generally, the homeland of IIr speech has been located to the north of Iran and North-West India, somewhere between the Southern Urals and the Hindukash. People speaking Old Indo-Aryan (OIA) are supposed to have passed through these wide steppe and desert belts before crossing the Hindukash and entering Gandhara and the Punjab, (viz., in the case of Old Iranian, before entering Iran proper). (Central Asian roots and acculturation in South Asia: Linguistic and Archeological Evidence from Western Central Asia, The Hindukash and North Western South Asia for Early Indo Aryan Language and Religion by Michael Witzel) Proto- Indo- European (PIE) North Indian European Indo-Iranian (IIr) Old Iranian Old Indo-Aryan (OIA) North of Iran (Gandhara & Punjab) North-West of India The Indo-Aryan languages are a sub-branch of the Indo-European family, spoken today mainly in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and the Maldives Islands by at least 640,000,000 persons (est. 1981). Although they are not the only languages spoken in any of these countries, their speakers in all cases constitute majorities. In the past, Indo-Aryan languages
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