Mahl Language - History

History

Maldivian has a continuous written history of about eight hundred years. The earliest writings were on the Lōmāfānu (copper-plate grants) of the 12th and 13th centuries. Early inscriptions on coral stone have also been found. The oldest inscription found to date is an inscription on a coral stone, which is estimated to be from around the 7th or 8th century.

Maldivian is based on Sanskrit foundations and it developed in relative isolation with little contact with the other languages until the 12th century. Since the 16th century, Maldivian has been written in a unique script called Thaana which is written from right to left, like that of Aramaic and Arabic (with which it shares several common diacritics for vowel sounds).

The foundation of the historical linguistic analysis of both Maldivian and Sinhalese was laid by Wilhelm Geiger (1856–1943). In Geiger’s comparative study of Maldivian (Mahl) and Sinhalese, he assumes that Maldivian is a dialectal offspring of Sinhalese and therefore is a “daughter language” of Sinhalese. However, the material he collected was not sufficient to judge the “degree of relationship” of Maldivian and Sinhalese.

Geiger concludes that Maldivian must have split from Sinhalese not earlier that the 10th century CE. However, there is nothing in the history of these islands or Sinhalese chronicles, even in legendary form that alludes to a migration of Sinhalese people which results such a connection.

Vitharana suggests that Maldivian did not evolve as a separate language to Sinhalese until 12th century CE. But Reynolds and others have suggested that Maldivian started showing indications of divergence as early as the 4th century CE.

De Silva proposes that Maldivian and Sinhalese must have branched off from a common mother language. He says that “the earliest Indic element in Maldivian is not so much a result of branching off from Sinhalese as a result of a simultaneous separation with Sinhalese from the Indic languages of the mainland of India”, referring to Dravidian influences seen in the Maldivian language, such as in old place names.

De Silva’s theory is supported by the legend of Prince Vijaya as told in the Mahavamsa because if this legend is to be believed, the migration of Indo-Aryan colonists to the Minicoy, Maldives and Sri Lanka from the mainland (India) must have taken place simultaneously. This means that Maldivian and Sinhalese must be “sister languages” that developed from a common Prakrit.

Whatever the origin of Maldivian, linguists agree that Maldivian is an Indo-Aryan language which also has older Indic elements in it.

A rare Maliku Thaana primer written in Maldivian published by the UT Lakshadweep Administration during the time of Rajiv Gandhi's rule was reprinted by Spanish researcher Xavier Romero-Frias in 2003.