adults should know about the right creed and pious works, and which I have compiled from books of great, renowned imam's, as Al-Ghazālī, Al-Nawāwī, Muhammad Ibn 'Arabi, Abdulkarīm Al-Jablī, Muhammad Ibn Fadlallāh, Ahmad Al-Kushāshī and others, together with a translation into the Ariwī-language for the use of whosoever does not fairly understand Arabic. I have named it: the great guides in the arranging of tenets, and divided it into an introduction, four paragraphs and a conclusion."
Now, every sentence of this dogmatical treatise is followed by its rendering into Tamil. The translation therefore is not an inter- linear one presenting the equivalents of each separate word and every suffix as is often the case in Malaised and Javanised Arabic texts, but a connected translation of complete periods, in full agreement with the syntax of the idiom used for the translation. But, it is almost superfluous to add, the language used shows au admixture of Arabic words and Persian terms such as is never found in non-Islamic Tamil writings.
The first question which presents itself is: why is the Tamii language indicated by the curious term Ariwī?[1]. Evidently, it represents the Islamic name for the Tamil idiom. At first sight one might be tempted to identify it with Ariwi, the language of Arvi in the Wardha Districts. But according to the Imperial Gazetteer (XXIV, 368):—"about 86 per cent. of the population are Hindus and nearly 4 per cent. Muhammedans. The statistics of language shows that 79 per cent. of the population speak Marathi of the remainder 13,642 persons (in 1908) probably all Muhammedans speak Urdu, 25,710 Hindi (principally Brāh- mans and Rajputs), 39,385 Gondī and 2,428 Telugu." Arvi moreover does not belong to the Tamil area, and counts too small a proportion of Moslems among its population to give its name to a language used by millions in other parts of India. But, it is known that Aruwa is one of the thirteen countries, in which the inferior type of Tamil is spoken[2] (un pays où l'on parle le bas tamoul), and although the language of this translation is by no means the so-called kodun Tamil (the rude, unpolished form), I am un- able to propose a more plausible derivation than that from Aruwa with the Arabic ending ī. Perhaps a better etymology may be given by some authority in Tamil matters; it may be added that in Hindustani arwā, being a Dakhui word, means: "of or belong- ing to Malabar," which nearly indicates the Tamil-speaking country.
- ↑ Arabic (
Arabic characters), but in the translation (Arabic characters) arabuppacai ariyadawanukku leeyawendi arawippacai kondu oraicceyiyappadi tagawum korwaiceyden idai peruwaitten etc.
- ↑ "13 Tamil-nadu ((language characters)) which belong to the country wherein Tamil is spoken, i. e. the Cen-tamil-nadu, where elegant Tamil is spoken and 12 in which the common language is spoken, as Tenpandi, Kuttam, Aruwa, Cinam, Matadu etc.
