Old Telugu (; ) is the earliest attested stage of the Telugu language.P. Ramasubramayam, "Old Telugu" in Sanford B. Steever, ed., The Dravidian Languages (London: Routledge, 2019) pp. 239-260. It is attested in various inscriptions, labels, and in early loanwords.
Old Telugu later evolved into Middle Telugu around 1000 CE, which then evolved into Modern Telugu around 1600 CE.
Etymology
In Modern Telugu, the term used for Old Telugu is పాత తెలుగు . The first word, పాత , meaning "old/ancient," is descended from Old Telugu ప్ఴాన్త / ప్రాఁత , ultimately from the reconstructed Proto-Dravidian word , of the same meaning. The word తెలుగు is descended from Old Telugu తెనుఙ్గు / తెనుఁగు .
The reconstructed Old Telugu term for the Old Telugu language is ప్ఴాన్దెనుఙ్గు / ప్రాఁదెనుఁగు . This word was not attested in Old Telugu, but functions as a neologism commonly used for descriptive purposes. The word consisted of the adjectival prefix ప్ఴాన్- / ప్రాఁ , and a sandhi form of the word తెనుఙ్గు / తెనుఁగు . The adjectival prefix is the same morpheme as ప్ఴాన్త / ప్రాఁత , thus deriving from Proto-Dravidian .
Attestation Some of the earliest attestations of Old Telugu can be found as the loan words in Prakrit inscriptions and literature dating to the early CE, including in Gaha Sattasai where several words like attā, vāluṁki, pīluā, pōṭṭaṁ, vēṇṭa, etc. are said to be of Old Telugu origin. A granite pillar in the Amaravati Stupa bears the Old Telugu word nāgabu dated to 2nd century BCE. A label found in Keesaragutta, reading tolacuvānḍru is dated to c. 400 CE. The earliest recorded long inscription was discovered in Kalamalla, dated to 575 CE. Several Old Telugu titles were found in the stone inscriptions issued by Mahendra Pallava dated to c.600 CE. Addanki inscription, laid in 848 CE bears the earliest recorded Telugu poem in taruvōja prosody. Pre-Nannaya era of Telugu literature, prior to c.1000 CE is believed to be dominated by Jain poets, including Pampa, Jinavallabha, Vemulawada Bheema Kavi, Sarvadeva and others, whose works have not survived to the present day. The first Telugu treatise on Prosody by Malliya Rechana has survived, it deals with adopted(from Sanskrit) and native Telugu metres, written around 940 CE.
Phonology In Old Telugu, the inherited Proto-Dravidian consonantal system was fairly well preserved except for incorporating the feature of voicing from the earliest known period. Other phonological innovations include:
Old Telugu maintained a three-way distinction of coronal consonants which includes, alveolar, retroflex and dental stops. ḏ was originally derived from PDr post-nasal *-ṯ- and constrasted with intervocalic trill -ṟ-. In very few cases -ḏ- did appear intervocalically, eg. caḏu (> ceḍu) vs. pāṟum but it was mostly an allophone of ṟ before n, eg. mūnḏu. Voiceless stops appeared at medial positions, by the simplification of geminates after a long vowel and a nasal, eg. *tōṇṭṭa > tōṇṭa (> tōṭa) 'garden'. Pre-plosive nasals are allophones in both Old and Modern Telugu; i.e., n before dentals, ṇ before retroflexes, ṉ before alveolars, ṅ before velars, ñ before palatals and m before labials. Aspirated consonants were borrowed from Indo-Aryan and were incorporated into the writing system, although colloquially the contrast of aspirated-unaspirated stops largely remained absent in most dialects and accents, even in Modern Telugu. Apical displacement was progressive for certain period of time, resulting in word-initial apical consonants in some words. This change was initiated in pre-historic times and is recorded historically, eg. *awanḏu > wānḏu ('that man'/'he'); puḻōl-> pḻōlu (> prōlu) ('city') Voicing of word-initial stops was progressive in some words. Both voiced and voiceless word-initials were recorded in inscriptions and might vary dialectally, eg. tūṟu > dūṟu ('to enter'); kaḍacina > gaḍicina ('that which is passed')
+Old Telugu ConsonantsLabialDentalAlveolarRetroflexPalatalVelarGlottalNasalm (మ)n (న)ɳ (ణ)PlosiveVoicelessp (ప)t̪ (త)ʈ (ట)tʃ (చ)k (క)Aspiratedpʰ (ఫ)t̪ʰ (థ)ʈʰ (ఠ)tʃʰ (ఛ)kʰ (ఖ)Voicedb (బ)d̪ (ద)d (ౚ, న్ఱ్)ɖ (డ)dʒ (జ)g (గ)Breathybʰ (భ)d̪ʰ (ధ)ɖʰ (ఢ)dʒʰ (ఝ)gʰ (ఘ)Fricatives (స)ʂ (ష)ʃ (శ)h (హ)Tapɾ (ర)Trillr (ఱ)Approximantʋ (వ)ɻ (ఴ)j (య)Lateral approximantl (ల)ɭ (ళ)
nḏ has its reflex being voiced retroflex stop in Modern Telugu, <ṟṟ> was either pronounced [r:] (derived from /r/) or [t:] (from PD *ṯṯ), former became rr while latter became ṭṭ, eg. goṟiya > goṟṟe > gorre; puṟṟa > puṭṭa. ḻ became a plosive other than in clusters where it became r by Middle Telugu, *kuḻ-, *eḻu-paHtu > OTe. kḻocce, ḻebb(h)adi > MTe. krocce, ḍebb(h)adi > Te. kocce, ḍebb(h)ai. Some of the initial retroflexes became dental, e.g. *uẓupp- > duppi. Most pre-plosive nasals got deleted by nasalizing the previous vowel in Middle Telugu and later loosing nasalization in Modern Telugu, eg. teluṅgu > telũgu > telugu and other various cluster simplifications like krōlu > kōlu. Modern Telugu is mostly free from retroflex ḷ and ṇ. However, dialectally ḷ is preserved as a geminate in plurals (from PDr plural *-Vḷ) as in *nīr-ḷ(u) > nīḷḷu ('waters') and regularly after retroflex ḍ and dental l, eg.: guḍi-ḷu > guḷḷu ('temples') and pagul-ḷu > paguḷḷu ('breakages').
Grammar Morphology Old Telugu is an agglutinative language primarily utilizing suffixes to express grammatical relationships. Noun morphology included gender markers and various derivational processes, while verb morphology was highly developed with distinct markers for tense, mood, and aspect.
Old Telugu preserved the two-way masculine vs non-masculine gender pattern intact, which is said to be the original case with Proto-Dravidian and this is also inherited by Modern Telugu.
Telugu branch is evidenced to have inherited all the four distinct plural markers of Dravidian, which are: -ḷ, -(n)k, -kVḷ and -r. By the time of early writings, -kVḷ marker underwent back-stem formation with the root words, losing its status as a distinct plural marker, eg. mrā̃-kulu (< *maran-kVḷ), later getting analyzed as mrā̃ku-lu, creating a root mrā̃ku (> Modern māku). Other examples include goḍugu, ciluka, eluka, īga.
The noun formative was -ambu, later -ammu >- amu > -am > -aũ, eg. OTe. paṭṭambu ('authority/power') > MTe./Te. paṭṭamu/paṭṭam > spoken Te. paṭṭaũ (coastal dialects).
Old Telugu and Proto-Dravidian maintained contrast in nominative and oblique forms of masculine singulars; as in wāṉḏu (nom.) vs wāni- (obl.), which is dialectally preserved in Modern Telugu.
Parts of speech Nouns in Old Telugu could be primary or derived, with primary nouns often being free forms and derived nouns formed through suffixation. Gender was signaled by specific suffixes and the overall morphology was influenced by both native Dravidian elements and Indo-Aryan borrowings.
Verbs Old Telugu verbs were categorized into finite and non-finite forms, with various suffixes indicating tense, mood, and agreement with subjects.
The language had two primary tense paradigms: past, non-past.
Past and non-past markers in Old Telugu were: -iti- (a combination of PDr past markers *-i- and *-tt-) and -VdV- (< PDr non-past *-t-) respectively. Pure past marker *-iy/*-i appeared in third person. These markers were followed by personal terminations, also varied by number.
+Old Telugu Finite Verb Formsan- : 'to say'PastNon-Past1st person an-iti-nan-eda-n an-udu-n an-iti-m an-eda-m an-udu-m2nd person an-iti-w an-eda-w an-udu-wan-iti-r an-eda-r an-udu-r3rd personan-iy-enan-unan-i-ran-eda-r an-udu-r
Epenthetic vowels, -i or -u might be attached at the finals for all the verb forms listed above.
Causative Verbs Old Telugu causative verb forms are listed as follows: kēy: 'to do'naḍu: 'to walk'PastParticiple kēy-i-ñc-inaḍa-pi-ñc-iFinite kēy-i-ñc-iyen naḍa-pi-ñc-iyenAdjectivekēy-i-ñc-inanaḍa-pi-ñc-inaNegative kēy-i-mp-a- naḍa-pi-mp-aInfinitivekēy-i-mp-annaḍa-pi-mp-anImperativekēy-i-mp-umunaḍa-pi-mp-umuNon-Pastkēy-i-mp-naḍa-pi-mp- Imperatives were formed by the addition of stems -umu (tin-umu: 'eat') in singular/non-honorific and -uṇḍu (tin-uṇḍu: 'eat') in plural/honorific usages, which became -Ø and -aṇḍi in Modern Telugu.
Pronouns The pronominal system in Old Telugu marked person, number, and gender. Reflexive pronouns and a range of demonstratives, interrogatives, and indefinites were also used. +Old Telugu Pronouns NominativeOblique1st person ēn nēn, nānnā nan- ēm nēm, mēm, manam (in.) mā (ex.) mana (in.) mam-2nd person īw, nīw nī nin-īr, *nīr, mīr mī mim-Reflexivesingular tāntan-pluraltām, tamar, tārtam- The third person is formed by personal & gender markers on demonstratives. eg.: *awanṯu > wāṉḏu (> wāḍu) : 'that man'; *iwanṯu > wīṉḏu (> wīḍu) : 'this man'; a-di : 'that thing' etc.
Declension + Old Telugu Declension Case maganḏu ('man'/'son') kēy(i) ('hand') koṭṭaṁbuḷ ('hamlets') Accusative maganin kētin koṭṭaṁbuḷan Instrumental maganicētan maganitōḻan kētitōḻan koṭṭaṁbuḷatōḻan koṭṭaṁbuḷacētan Dative maganiki(n) kētiki(n) koṭṭaṁbuḷaku(n) Ablative magani-nuṇḍi magani-nuñci kēti-nuṇḍi kēti-nuñci koṭṭaṁbuḷa-nuṇḍi koṭṭaṁbuḷa-nuñci Genitive magani kēti koṭṭaṁbuḷa Locative maganiyandun maganiyoḷan
maganiḷōn kētiyandun kētiyoḷan
kētiḷōn koṭṭaṁbuḷandun koṭṭaṁbuḷan koṭṭaṁbuḷoḷan koṭṭaṁbuḷaḷōn
Syntax The structure of Old Telugu sentences typically involved nominative-accusative alignment, with case markers indicating the grammatical roles of nouns. The language employed a variety of case forms and postpositions to express detailed semantic relations.
Vocabulary
Native numerals + English Old Telugu Modern Telugu Notesoneఒన్ఱు ఒక్కొన్ఱు ఒండు ఒకటి ఒండు is rarely used in modern spoken Telugu; its usage remains chiefly literary. However, it still appears in words like oṇṭi, oṇṭari : 'single', 'lonely'. ఒకటి is used in its place as a numeral, which is derived from okkoṇṭi, the oblique form of .twoరెణ్డు *రేణ్డు
*ఎరణ్డు *రెండు orthographical changethreeమూన్ఱు మూడు ṉḏ → ḍfourనాలుఙ్గు నాలుగు N → ∅ / V_Cfiveఏను ఏను అయిదు
ఐదు ఏను is rarely used in modern spoken Telugu; its usage remains chiefly literary. However, its occurrence is found intact in the numerals padihēnu: 'fifteen' and yābʰay (< ēn-pʰadi): 'fifty'. అయిదు and ఐదు are used in its place. Both variants come from Proto-Dravidian *caymtu.sixఆఱు ఆరు ṟ → rsevenఏఴు ఏడు ḻ → ḍeightఎణిమిది ఎణుమ్బొది ఎనిమిది ṇ → nnineతొన్బిది తొమ్బిది తొమ్మిది nb, mm → mmtenపది -భది
-ప్ఫది
-వది పది -భై
-ప్ఫై
-వై పది is the cardinal number The suffixes are the equivalent of English -ty (e.g. sixty, seventy), used for multiples of ten. The reconstructed Proto-Dravidian laryngeal *H (PDr *paHtu) has its reflex being an aspiration as -bʰadi/-ppʰadi; d → ∅ / V_Vtwelveపదిరెణ్డు పణ్ౚెణ్డు
పన్రెణ్డు పన్నెండు nr → nnsixtyఅఱవది అరవై ṟ → r, d → ∅ / V_Vone hundredనూఱు నూరు వంద నూరు evolved as a result of the ṟ → r merge. వంద (of unknown origin) is the standard term, and is used natively by the Telangana and Coastal Andhra dialects. However, in most of the dialects nūṟu still appears in the numbers above 100, with its oblique from: nūṭa-iraway-enimidi: 'one hundred and twenty-eight', etc. one thousandవేయి వేయి వెయ్యి Telugu is the only Dravidian language to have a native word for "thousand" (wēyi), while other literary languages borrowed Indo-Aryan sahasra.
Primary colours There are four primary colours in Old Telugu, with the root words being:
వెళ్-/తెల్- : 'white' కార్- : 'black' కెమ్-/చెమ్- : 'red' పచ్చ్-/పస్- : 'green' & 'yellow'.
Both Old Telugu and Proto-Dravidian had absence of roots which distinguish green and yellow, a feature which still exists in modern spoken Telugu.
Toponymic Suffixes The historical place-name suffixes of Telugu-speaking regions were as follows: