Oriya ଓଡ଼ିଆ oṛiā
Spoken in:	India
Region:	Orissa
Total speakers:	31 million (1996)
Ranking:	32 (1996)
Language family:	}}}  Indo-Iranian   Indo-Aryan    Eastern Group     Oriya group      Oriya}}}
Writing system:	Oriya script
Official status
Official language of:	India
Regulated by:	no official regulation
Language codes
ISO 639-1:	or
ISO 639-2:	ori
ISO 639-3:	ori

Oriya (ଓଡ଼ିଆ oṛiā) is one of the Indian languages mainly spoken in the Indian state of Orissa, though there are also significant Oriya-speaking populations in other linguistic regions, such as the Midnapore District of West Bengal, the Saraikela Kharsawan District of Jharkhandand the Ichhapuram muncipality of Andra Pradesh. Due to the increasing migration of labour, the west Indian state of Gujarat also has a significant Oriya speaking population with Surat being the second largest Oriya speaking city in India. The language is also an official language of India. Oriya is an Eastern Indo-Aryan language belonging to the Indo-Aryan language family. It is thought to be directly descended from the Prakrit known as Purva Magadhi that was spoken in eastern India over 1,500 years ago. It bears a very strong resemblance to the modern languages Bangla (Bengali), Maithili, and Ôxômiya (Assamese). Of all the languages spoken in northern India, Oriya appears to be the least influenced by Persian language.

Oriya has a rich literary heritage dating back to the thirteenth century. Sarala Dasa who lived in the fourteenth century is known as the Vyasa of Orissa. He translated the Mahabharata into Oriya. In fact the language was initially standardised through a process of translation of classical Sanskrit texts like the Mahabharata, the Ramayana and the Srimad Bhagabatam. Jagannatha Das translated the Srimad Bhagabatam into Oriya and his translation standardized the written form of the language. Oriya has had a strong tradition of poetry, especially that of devotional poetry.

Some other eminent Oriya Poets include Kabi Samrat Upendra Bhanja and Kabi Surya Bala Dev Ratha.

Prose in the language has had a late development. Distinguished prose writers of the modern period include Fakir Mohan Senapati, Manoj Das, Bibhuti Pattnaik, Pratibha Rai, Surendra Mohanty, Madhusudan Das, Kishori Charan Das, Kalindi Charan Panigrahi, Hari Hara Das, and Gopinath Mohanty. But it is poetry that makes modern Oriya literature a force to reckon with. Poets like Sachidananda Routray, Guruprasad Mohanty, Soubhagya Misra, Ramakanta Rath, and Sitakanta Mohapatra have made significant contributions towards Indian poetry.

Oriya has traditionally had a strong Buddhist and Jain influence.

Oriya is written with the Oriya script. There's a book written by an eminent linguist professor Dr. Kunja Bihari Tripathi titled "The evolution of Oriya language and script". Prof.Golak Bihari Dhall has also made significant contribution towards the understanding of Oriya language's development.

History

The history of the Oriya language is divided into Old Oriya (10th century-1300), Early Middle Oriya (1300-1500), Middle Oriya (1500-1700), Late Middle Oriya (1700-1850) and Modern Oriya (1850 till present day). Oriya literature up to 1500AD mainly covers poems and proses with religion, gods and goddesses as the main theme. The earliest use of prose can be found in the Madala Panji or the Palm-leaf Chronicles of the Jagannatha temple at Puri, which date back to the 12th century. The first great poet of Orissa is the famous Sarala-dasa who wrote the Chandi Purana and the Vilanka Ramayana, both praising the goddess Durga. Rama-bibha, written by Arjuna-dasa, is the first long poem in Oriya language.

The next era is more commonly called the Jagannatha Dasa Period and stretches till the year 1700. The period begins with the writings of Shri Chaitanya whose Vaishnava influence brought in a new evolution in Oriya literature. Balarama Dasa, Jagannatha Dasa, Yasovanta, Ananta and Acyutananda were the main exponents in religious works in Oriya. The composers of this period mainly translated, adapted, or imitated Sanskrit literature. A few prominent works of this period include the Usabhilasa of Sisu Sankara Dasa, the Rahasya-manjari of Deva-durlabha Dasa and the Rukmini-bibha of Kartikka Dasa. A new form of novels in verse evolved during the beginning of the 17th century when Ramachandra Pattanayaka wrote Haravali. Other poets like Madhusudana, Bhima, Dhivara, Sadasiva and Sisu Isvara-dasa composed another form called Kavyas or long poems based on themes from Puranas. The language used by them was plain and simple Oriya.

However, from the turn of the 18th century, verbally tricky Oriya became the order of the day. Verbal jugglery, obscenity and eroticism became the trend of the period between 1700-1850, the most notable poet being Upendra Bhanja (1670-1720). Other poets turned up in hordes to imitate him but none could fit into his shoes, with the exceptions of Bhima Bhoi and Arakshita Dasa. Family chronicles in prose and literature relating religious festivals and rituals also covered a large portion of this period.

The first Oriya printing typeset was cast in 1836 by the Christian missionaries. The actual Oriya script closely resembled Bengali and Assamese scripts but the one adopted for the printed typesets were completely different, leaning more towards the Tamil script.

Three great poets and prose writers, Rai Bahadur Radhanatha Ray (1849-1908), Madhusudana Rao (1853-1912) and Phakiramohana Senapati (1843-1918) settled in Orissa and made Oriya their own. They brought in a modern outlook and spirit into Oriya literature. Around the same time the modern drama took birth in the works of Rama Sankara Ray beginning with Kanci-Kaveri (1880).

20th century writers in Oriya include Nanda-kisora Bal, Gangadhara Mehera, Chintamani Mahanti and Kuntala-Kumari Sabat Utkala-bharati, besides Niladri Dasa and Gopabandhu Dasa (1877-1928). The most notable novelists were Umesa Sarakara, Divyasimha Panigrahi, Gopala Praharaja and Kalindi Charana Panigrahi. Sachi Kanta Rauta Ray is the great introducer of the ultra-modern style in modern Oriya poetry. Others who took up this form were Godabarisa Mohapatra, Dr Mayadhara Manasimha, Nityananda Mahapatra and Kunjabihari Dasa. Prabhasa Chandra Satpati is known for his translations of some western classics apart from Udayanatha Shadangi, Sunanda Kara and Surendranatha Dwivedi. Criticism, essays and history also became major lines of writing in the Oriya language. Esteemed writers in this field were Professor Girija Shankar Ray, Pandit Vinayaka Misra, Professor Gauri Kumara Brahma, Jagabandhu Simha and Hare Krushna Mahatab. Oriya literature mirrors the industrious, peaceful and artistic image of the Oriya people who have offered and gifted much to the Indian civilization in the field of art and literature.

Phoneme inventory

Oriya has 28 consonant phonemes and 6 vowel phonemes.

Vowels

	Front	Back
High	i	u
Mid	e	o
Low	a	ɔ

Consonants

	Labial	Dental	Alveolar	Retroflex	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Voiceless stops	p pʰ	t̪ t̪ʰ		ʈ ʈʰ	ʧ ʧʰ	k kʰ
Voiced stops	b bʰ	d̪ d̪ʰ		ɖ ɖʰ	ʤ ʤʰ	ɡ ɡʰ
Voiceless fricatives			s				h
Nasals	m		n	ɳ
Liquids			l, r	ɭ

See also

• Oriya script
• Oriya people
• Languages of India
• List of national languages of India
• List of Indian languages by total speakers
• Brahmic family

Bibliography

Neukom, Lukas and Manideepa Patnaik. 2003. A grammar of Oriya. (Arbeiten des Seminars für Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft; 17). Zürich: Seminar für Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft der Universität Zürich. ISBN 3-9521010-9-5

Further reading

• Ghosh, A. (2003). An ethnolinguistic profile of Eastern India: a case of South Orissa. Burdwan: Dept. of Bengali (D.S.A.), University of Burdwan.
• Masica, Colin (1991). The Indo-Aryan Languages. Cambridge Language Surveys. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521299442

External links

• www.odia.org Learn oDiA (Oriya). On the way of conservation of oDiA Language and culture. "Lets take a step"
• www.odisha.com World's first and only 24x7 popular news portal in Oriya.
• Useful Oriya phrases in English and other Indian languages.
• Romanised to Unicode Oriya transliterator
• Unicode Entity Codes for the Oriya Script
• Free/Open Source Oriya Computing Rebati project
• Oriya Unicode Fonts
• Dura Drusti - Oriya eMagazine Published twice a year
• www.LordJagannath.com First website in Oriya language on Lord Jagannath.

•  • [ e] Indo-Iranian languages
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