Culturescape: The Origin of Urdu

Urmi Chanda-Vaz
Jun 23, 2016
1 min read

The beautiful language of Urdu is mostly associated with the Muslim community of India and Pakistan and is the official language of not just our neighbour country but also of the Indian states of Bihar, Delhi, Jammu & Kashmir, Uttar Pradesh and Telangana. Thanks to poets and lyricists of Bollywood, most Indians are acquainted with the language, but not many know about the interesting story of its origin.

The word 'Urdu' comes from the Turkish word 'Ordu', which means army. The language developed during the early Muslim invasions starting from the 12th century due to the intermingling of the occupying armies and the local people. Urdu developed from an Indian dialect called Khariboli and most of its words are derived from Sanskrit and Prakrit. It has terms borrowed from Turkish, Arabic and Persian as well. It is very similar to Hindi but is written in the Persian script. It was, in fact, referred to as Hindi between the 13th and 18th centuries. The British patronised Urdu, replacing the official Mughal language of Persian.

Since then, Urdu, known for its genteel tone and delicacy has inspired generations of poets and writers, giving us a legacy of beautiful Urdu literature and poetry.