THE SINHALESE LANGUAGE. 



35 



comes from hattha in the sense of an * arm ' of a tree. Even if we 

 except the first and the two last of these four words, the result 

 of the comparison is that in the above list but one Tamil word 

 (akal) bears a relation to the Sinhalese, and that more than nine- 

 tenths* of the words in the Sinhalese, especially ' as it exists as a. 

 written language in the literature of this island,' is traceable to a 

 Pali origin, exhibiting evidence, in some important particulars, that 

 the corruption of the Pali into the Sinhalese has arisen from that 

 natural process of change which we see exemplified in Europe in 

 the corruption of the Latin into the Italian and the French. 



A careful inter-comparison of Indian dialects with one another,, 

 and the Sinhalese with them, also furnishes us with proof confirmatory 

 of the Historical fact — that the Sinhalese was imported into Ceylon 

 by its first Colonistsf from North-India. 



Mr, Caldwell, who may be regarded as the best authority in all 

 matters relating to Dravidian languages, states: — ' The Scythian or 

 Dravidian element is substantially one and the same in all the ver- 

 nacular languages of India, whether Northern or Southern, but is 

 smallest in amount in those districts of Northern India which were 

 first conquered by the Aryans; greater in the remoter districts of 

 the Dekhan, Telingana, and Mysore; and greatest of all in the 

 Tamil country, at the Southern extremity of the peninsula, to 



* " But the Sinhalese, the vernacular language of the Island, is decidedly 

 allied to the Northern family, as it is supposed to have nine-tenths of its 

 vocables from the Sanskrit " — The Rev. S. Hardy in C. B. A. S. Journal, ii. 

 p. 99. 



f 1 At the place where mention is made of 4 Sihala language,', what can^ 

 Sihala language signify? As it is said that king Sihabahu took Siha captive,. 



so the name Siha-la is derived from that circumstance, As, aganv 



the city in which Sakkra dwells is named Sakkra-city, so the Island in which 

 the Sihala dwell is called Sihala-isl&nd. As also people who are natives of a- 

 place speak in their native tongue, so likewise the people of this Sihala country- 

 make use of the Sihala speech— their language is thence named the Sihala lan^ 

 guage? -Pradrpikava, quoted in the Sidatsangara, p. xxy. 



