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Howar (also Khawar)
A group of related languages dating back to the Old Indian language; together with Dardic and Iranian languages, they are descendants of the Indo-Iranian language community which is part of the Indo-European family of languages.
Indian languages are spoken in northern and central India (Hindi, Urdu, Bengali, Punjabi, Marathi, Gujarati, Oriya, Assami, *Sindhi and others), Pakistan (Urdu, Punjabi, Sindhi), Bangladesh (Bengali), Sri Lanka (Sinbala, in the south of the island), Maldive Republic (Divehi), Nepal (Nepali), Gypsy and Parya (a dialect spoken in the Gissar Valley of Tajikistan). In all, approximately 770 million people speak *Indo-Aryan languages. In the west and north-west, Indian languages border or Iranian (*Balochi, *Pushtu) and Dardic languages; in the north and north-east, with Tibetan and *Himalayan languages; in the east, with a number of Tibetan-Burmese and Mon-Khmer languages; in the south, with *Dravidian languages (Telugu, Kannada). In India, a few islands of other linguistic groups (Munda, Mon-Khmer, Dravidian and other languages) exist surrounded by the Indian languages.

The oldest period in the development of Indo-Aryan languages is represented by the Vedic language that functioned since the early twelfth century BC and several literary varieties of Sanskrit (the epic variety of the third and second centuries BC, the epigraphic variety of the first centuries of the new era, and classical Sanskrit which flourished in the fourth and fifth centuries of the new era). A few Indo-Aryan words from a dialect different from the Vedic (names of gods and kings and a few terms from horse-breeding) are recorded since the sixteenth century BC in what is known as Mittanian * Aryan in documents from Asia Minor and Near Asia.The Middle Indian period, in the development of Indo-Aryan languages, was represented by numerous languages and dialects used in spoken and later, written forms in the middle of the first millennium Be. The most archaic of these was Pali (the language of the Buddhist Canon), followed by the Prakrits (the Prakrits of inscriptions are the more archaic ones) and Apabhransha (the dialects that evolved from the first millennium AD through the development of the Prakrits); they are a transitional stage of modern Indian languages.

BIBLIOGRAPY: G.A. Zograph, 'Languages of South Asia', Moscow, 1990 (in Russian); id., 'The Morphological Structure oj New Indo-Aryan Languages', Moscow, 1976 (in Russian); T. Ya. Yelizarenkova, 'Studies in the Diachronic Phonology of Indo-Aryan Languages', Moscow, 1974 (in Russian);

'Languages of Asia and Africa', Vo!' I. Indo-Aryan Languages, Moscow, 1976 (in Russian); J. Beames, 'A Comparative Grammar of the Modern Aryan Languages of India: to Wit, Hindi, Punjabi, Sindhi. Gujarati, Marathi, Oriya and Bengali', Vols. 1-3, London, 1872-9; R. Hoernle, 'A Comparative Grammar of the Gaudian Languages', London, 1880; G.A. Grierson, 'Linguistic Survey oj India', Vols. 1 -11, Calcutta, 1903-28; T.G. Bailey, 'Studies in North Indian Languages', London, 1938; J. Baloch, 'Indo-Aryan from the Vedas to Modern Times', Paris, 1965; R.L. Turner, 'A Comparative Dictionary oj the Indo-Aryan Languages', London, 1962-9.