These all when assembled at the capital would doubtless strike out some common language by which they could communicate with each other, just as in the present day Urdu is used all over India.[1] But just as this Urdu is spoken incorrectly by those whose mother-tongue it is not, so that the Bengali corrupts it by an admixture of Bengali words and forms, and speaks it with a strong Bengali accent; so in ancient times these servants and artificers, collected from all corners of a vast empire, would speak the common lingua franca each with his own country twang; and the Prakrit of the plays would appear to be an exaggerated representation, or caricature, of these provincial brogues.
But there are works of a more serious character to which we can refer for a solution of the problem of the real nature of the Prakrits. In the sixth century before Christ there arose in Behar the great reformer Sakyamuni, surnamed Buddha, or “the wise,” who founded a religion which for ten centuries drove Brahmanism into obscurity, and was the prevailing creed of almost all India. The religious works of the Buddhist faith, which are extremely numerous and voluminous, have been the means of preserving to us the Magadhi Prakrit of those days. Buddhism was imported into Ceylon in 307 b.c., and the Magadhi dialect under the name of Pali has become the sacred language of that island.[2]
- ↑ It is a characteristic peculiarity of India, arising from want of means of communication, that trades and professions are still confined to particular localities; one town produces swords, and nothing else; another is entirely devoted to silk-weaving, and no other town but that one presumes to rival it.
- ↑ It must however be stated that there are reasons for doubting whether the Pali of Ceylon is really the same as the Magadhi. Some authors are inclined to doubt this, and state that the Pali corresponds more closely with forms of Prakrit spoken in Western India, It matters little or nothing to the present inquiry whether this be so or not. We are only indirectly concerned with Prakrit in this work. It is sufficient to say that the Pandits of Ceylon use the words Pali and Magadhi as convertible terms. Pali in fact means only “writing.”
