Sanskrit was considered as ‘DEV BHASHA’ or ‘DEVAVANI’, the Language of the Gods by ancient Indians. The script is called DEVNAGARI which means used in the cities of the Gods. The earliest form of Sanskrit language was Vedic Sanskrit that came approximately around 1500B.C, a period when knowledge was imparted orally through generations.
In many places of India, Sanskrit is considered a dead language or at best a dying language. People no longer speak this language. Some historians and linguists blame this because Sanskrit is considered as the language of Brahmins. They feel that common people have stopped talking in this language because Brahmins used to speak this language.
However, there are still few villages in modern India where people, irrespective of their castes, speak in Sanskrit. They speak Sanskrit even in their home.The villagers also insist the visitors converse in Sanskrit with them. Banter, greetings, quarrels on the streets, teaching – it’s all in Sanskrit here.
1. Mattur, Karnataka
Mattur is a quaint village in Karnataka that lies some 300 km from Bangalore. It is located on the banks of River Tunga and is at a distance of about 8 km from Shimoga (Shivamogga). It is a village widely known for the usage of Sanskrit for day-to-day communication. Mattur has a Rama temple, a Shivalaya, Someshwara, and Lakshmikeshava temples. It is one of the rare villages in India where Sanskrit is spoken as a regional language. Sanskrit is the vernacular of a majority of the 5,000 residents of this quaint, sleepy hamlet, as shopkeepers, laborers, and even children speak it fluently. Mattur is famous as the Sanskrit village of India.
It is a unique accomplishment that the residents of Mattur have managed to keep alive the ancient language through their day-to-day communication in Sanskrit even though the official and native language of the state is Kannada.
Mattur is mainly inhabited by the Sankethis, a Brahmin community that had migrated from Kerala and settled down in Mattur about 600 years ago. Till the early part of the 1980’s decade the villagers of Mattur spoke in Kannada and Tamil. Sanskrit was considered to be the language of the upper caste Brahmins. Then the priest of the local religious centre asked the residents to adopt Sanskrit as their native language.
The whole village heeded to the call and started conversing in the ancient language. Since then it is not just the members of the Sankethis community but members of all the communities residing in the village, irrespective of their social or economic standing, have started communicating in Sanskrit.
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