El tamil o támil (autoglotónimo தமிழ் támiḻ [ˈtamiɻ]) es una lengua drávida que se habla principalmente en Tamil Nadu (India) y en el noreste de Sri Lanka. Es la lengua dravídica con el segundo mayor número de hablantes después del telugu y es la de mayor desarrollo literario. Actualmente se calcula que tiene unos 70 millones de hablantes. Existen también destacados núcleos de hablantes en Malasia, Vietnam, Singapur (donde es una de las cuatro lenguas oficiales del país), la isla de Zanzíbar (Tanzania) y, recientemente, en diversas ciudades europeas importantes, entre las que destaca Londres. Cuenta con una rica y antigua tradición literaria, remontándose los primeros escritos de esta lengua, consistentes en poesía lírica y una gramática, hasta el siglo I d. C. El sistema de escritura del tamil desciende del alfabeto brahmi. Combina consonantes con vocales para crear caracteres silábicos únicos pero, al contrario que las otras escrituras derivadas del brahmi, no tiene caracteres que representen sonidos con más de una consonante. Ahora que el tamil está recibiendo gran influencia de otras lenguas, su sistema de escritura está teniendo problemas a la hora de representar los nuevos vocablos.

Leer el artículo completo en Wikipedia · CC-BY-SA

Tamil /ˈtæmɪl/ (தமிழ், tamiḻ, [t̪ɐmɨɻ] ?) is a Dravidian language predominantly spoken by the Tamil people of India and Sri Lanka, and also by the Tamil diaspora, Sri Lankan Moors, Burghers and Chindians. Tamil is an official language of two countries, Singapore and Sri Lanka. It has official status in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and the Indian Union Territory of Puducherry. It is also used as one of the languages of education in Malaysia, along with English, Malay and Mandarin. In India, outside of Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, Tamil is also spoken in the states of Kerala and Andaman and Nicobar Islands as a secondary language, and by minorities in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. It is one of the 22 scheduled languages of India. It was declared as a classical language by the Government of India in 2004. The language is also spoken by Tamil minorities among the diaspora in Malaysia, the United Arab Emirates, the United States, United Kingdom, Mauritius, Canada, South Africa, Fiji, Germany, the Philippines, the Netherlands, Indonesia and France, as well as smaller emigrant communities elsewhere. Tamil is one of the longest-surviving classical languages in the world. Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions from 500 BC have been found on Adichanallur and 2,200-year-old Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions have been found on Samanamalai. It has been described as "the only language of contemporary India which is recognizably continuous with a classical past." The variety and quality of classical Tamil literature has led to it being described as "one of the great classical traditions and literatures of the world". A recorded Tamil literature has been documented for over 2000 years. The earliest period of Tamil literature, Sangam literature, is dated from ca. 300 BC – AD 300. It has the oldest extant literature among other Dravidian languages. The earliest epigraphic records found on rock edicts and hero stones date from around the 3rd century BC. More than 55% of the epigraphical inscriptions (about 55,000) found by the Archaeological Survey of India are in the Tamil language. Tamil language inscriptions written in Brahmi script have been discovered in Sri Lanka, and on trade goods in Thailand and Egypt. The two earliest manuscripts from India, acknowledged and registered by UNESCO Memory of the World register in 1997 and 2005, were written in Tamil. In 1578, Portuguese Christian missionaries published a Tamil prayer book in old Tamil script named 'Thambiraan Vanakkam,' thus making Tamil the first Indian language to be printed and published. In 2014 Tamil Lexicon, published by the University of Madras, was the first among the dictionaries published in any Indian language. Tamil is used as a sacred language of Ayyavazhi and in Tamil Hindu traditions of Shaivism and Vaishnavism. According to a 2001 survey, there were 1,863 newspapers published in Tamil, of which 353 were dailies.

Leer el artículo completo en Wikipedia · CC-BY-SA