Canarese (kannada), nArAyaNa, -kur/-kUr in placenames

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>I believe that various languages of India are due to superposition on

>these tribal languages. In India, there have been numerous migrations

>within. There have been local variabilities which gave rise to languages

>such as Bengali, Marathi, etc in the north ; and Southern Languages also

>like Telugu, Kannar, Mayalee etc are slightly different because of the

>distance, and mountain ranges ( the Vindhyas ) which hindered mobility.

 

Telugu, tamil, kannaDa, malayALam form the 4 major

literary languages of the Dravidian family, there are

many more in the drav. family but none has literatures

spanning millennia. Tamil literature predates those

in Telugu etc. by about a 1000 years, and has its own

Poetics and Meta-langauge.

 

It's interesting that you call "kannar"(a) for kannaDa,

the -naDa in kannaDa is related with -nADu in

tamilnADu and karnATaka. Since east Indian languages eg., Bengali)

lack the retroflex L, many times -L- is converted

to -D-. Also, in tamil also this works in the formation

of words a) kuL- "curve", kuLam 'pond', kuDam "pot"

b) toL- "to dig", toDu "to dig", toTTi 'tank', toLai 'hole' etc.

etc.

 

kannaDa was called Canarese till recently in english

this's from kannar.

 

Also, nALam/nAr/nADA "reed, thread etc." in tamil.

Another meaning of naL-/nAL- is black in tamil:

nALaNan/nADaNan > nArAyaNa (nAraNanin tamil lit.). We commonly see

Narayana sleeping in the anantha serpent as black.

CilappatikAram calls him black on the nAgam, and

Alvars sing the SriranganAthar as black-jewel(karumaNi).

 

Also, consider -kur/-kUr ending in placenames of S. India,

this comes from the drav. -kuDi 'hamlet' > -kur/-kUr.

(Cf. kannaDa/kannara, nALaNan(nADaNan/nAraNan)

 

Regards,

N. Ganesan

 

 

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