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OCTOBER, 1899.) EAST-CENTRAL GROUP OF INDO-ARYAN VERNACULARS. 263
Its geographical abitat. - This language, which includes three main dialects, Awadhi, Baghell, and Chattisgarhi, occupies parts of six provinoes, vie., Oudh, the North-Western Provinces, Baghelkhand, Bundelkhand, Chota Nagpur, and the Central Provinces. It covers the whole of Oudh, except the district of Hardoi and a small portion of Fyzabad. In the North-Western Provinces, it covers, roughly speaking, the country between Benares and Hamirpur in Bundelkhand. It occupies the whole of Baghelkhand, the North-West of Bundelkhand, the South-Sono tract of the District of Mirzapur, the States of Chang Bhakâr, Sarguja, Udaipar, and Korea, and a portion of Jashpur, in Chota Nagpar. In the Central Provinces, it covers the districts of Jabalpur and Mandla, and the greater part of Chhattisgarh with its Feudatory States
The dialects. -- The three dialects of Eastern Hindi closely resemble each other. Indeed, Baghell differs so little from Awadhi, that, were it not popularly recognised as a separate speech, I should have certainly classed it as a form of that dialect. Its separate existence has only been resognised in preference to popular prejudice, Chhattisgarbi, under the influence of the neighbouring Marathi and Osiyż, shows greater points of difference; but its close connection with Awacht is nevertheless apparent. The Awadht-cum-Baghell dialect covers the whole Eastern Hindt Area of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh, and of Bandelkhand, Bagbelkband, Chand Bhakar, and the districts of Jabalpur and Mandla. It is also spoken by some scattered tribes in the Central Provinces districts to the south and west. It we wish to make a dividing line between Awadhi and Baghelf, we may take the river Jamna where it runs between Fatehpar and Banda, and, thence, the southern boundary of the Allahabad District. This is not quite accurate, for the Tirbêri dialect, spoken on the north bank of the Jamna in Fatehpar, shows sufficient peculiarities to entitle it to be classed as Baghell; and the language of the south-east of Allahabad, which is locally known as Baghali, but which I have classed as Awadhi, is a mixture of the two dialects. The boundary must be uncertain, for there is hardly any definite poculiarity which we can seize upon a decisive test. Chhattisgarbi oocupies the remainder of the Eastern Hindt traot, that is to say, the States of Udaipar, Korea and Sargaja, and portion of Jashpur, in the Chota Nagpur Province, and the greater part of Chhattisgarh.
As above described, Eastern Hindi occupies an irregular oblong tract of country, extending from, but not including, Nepal to the Bastar Státe in the Central Province, much longer from north to south than it is from east te west. Its mean length may be roughly taken as 750 miles, and its mean breadth about 250, which together give an area of about 187,500 square miles. The number of speakers of each dialect is roughly as follows: Awadht ...
*** *** *** ... ... 16,000,000 Bagheli ... ... ... ... ... ... 4,612,756
20,612,756 Chhattisgahl ... ... " "" "" . ... ...
3,719,725
Total... 24,331,999
With reference to the above figures, it should be explained that, probably owing to the prestige of the court at Lucknow, Awadbi is spoken as a vernacular not only in the tract above described, but also by Muhammadans over the Eastern parts of the North-Western Provinces, and the greater part of Bihar, the language of which is, in the main, Bibârt, I estimate the number of these Awadhi-speaking Musalmans at about a million, and these figures are included in the figures for Awadhi given above. Similarly, as regards Chhattiegashi, the above figures include not only the speakers of that dialect in the area of which it is the vernacular, but also 34,095 speakers of it in the neighbouring Chhattisgaph and Orissa Feudatory States, whose main language is Oriya. In both Cases, the speakers are permanent residents of the areas in wbiob they were found, so that the total above given represents the namber of speakers of Eastern Hindi in their proper homes.
