| Also Known As: Bihari,Maghori,Magodhi,Magaya,Magi,Magadhi,Maghaya,Megahi,Maghai
Description:
The Magahi language (मगही, also known as मगधी, Magadhi) is a language spoken in India. The ancestor of Magadhi, from which its name derives, Magadhi Prakrit, is believed to be the language spoken by the Buddha, and the language of the ancient kingdom of Magadha. Magadhi is closely related to Bhojpuri and Maithili and these languages are sometimes referred to as a single language, Bihari. These languages, together with several other related languages, are known as the Bihari languages, which form a sub-group of the Eastern Zone group of Indo-Aryan languages. Magadhi has approximately 13 million speakers.
It was once mistakenly thought to be a dialect of Hindi, but has been more recently shown to be descendant of and very similar to Eastern Group of Indic languages, along with Bengali, Assamese, and Oriya. It has a very rich and old tradition of folk songs and stories. It is spoken in 8 districts in Bihar, 3 in Jharkhand and has some speakers in Malda, West Bengal.
Despite of the large number of speakers of Magadhi, it has not been constitutionally recognized in India. Even in Bihar, Hindi is the language used for educational and official matters. Magahi was legally absorbed under..... full article at Wikipedia |
