Literature and language

In this period, literature flourished in many languages: Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Odia, Hindavi, Bengali and Marathi, in everyday speech and in poetry.

Bhakti poetry and song drove much of it, spreading ideas in simple words. Chaitanya Mahāprabhu influenced 16th-century Bengali literature, including a new folk song style, Dhāmāli, which entered kathak dance.

Books were translated in every direction. Kavindra Paramesvara translated the Mahābhārata into Bengali, and Persian poetry was translated into Bengali. Non-religious themes became popular too.

Patrons mattered:

• Krishnadevaraya supported poets in the south;
• the Gajapati kings of Odisha supported literature and spiritual thought;
• at Vijayanagara, some rulers were poets themselves.

Tirumalamba was a celebrated poet at the court of Achyutadevaraya of Vijayanagara. She was a polymath (expert in many subjects) and polyglot (spoke many languages), and wrote a Sanskrit kāvya (long poem) about the king's wedding.

Persian, the Mughals' language, became the language of government and court life. And Persian texts "often helped preserve Indian knowledge from earlier times".

Sanskrit works were translated into Persian:

• Bhāskarāchārya's Līlavatī (mathematics): three times;
• Kalhaṇa's Rājatarangiṇī (history of Kashmir): once.

Dara Shikoh, the elder brother of Aurangzeb, translated 52 Upaniṣhads into Persian, with scholars in Varanasi. These translations reached Europe and influenced great 19th-century philosophers. Aurangzeb had him executed for heresy.

Urdu grew in the Ganga-Yamuna plains from Hindavi, taking in Arabic and Persian words. South of the Deccan it became Dakhini, borrowing from Telugu and Marathi. So a person going from Lucknow to Hyderabad may find the Urdu there sounds different.

Amir Khusrau is called the 'father of Urdu literature'. He wrote in Hindavi, Punjabi and Braj Bhasha, and knew Sanskrit well.