Magadh · Middle & Lower Gangetic Plain

Dialect and oral traditions

Magahi's ancestor is Magadhi Prakrit, the vernacular of the Mauryan court and the language in which the earliest Buddhist and Jain material was transmitted. From it descend not only Magahi but Bhojpuri, Maithili, Bengali, Assamese and Odia. The modern language has around 1.3 crore speakers, a modern literature and a long-standing campaign for Eighth Schedule recognition, and it is one of the largest languages in India without it.

Speech varieties

Central MagahiIndo-Aryan, Eastern (Bihari group)

The Gaya, Nalanda and Nawada register; the basis of what modern Magahi writing there is.

Speakers: About 1.27 crore in the 2011 Census

Southern MagahiIndo-Aryan, Eastern

Spoken in Aurangabad, Palamu and Chatra, shading into the Sadri and Nagpuri of the Chota Nagpur plateau.

Patna and the urban registerIndo-Aryan

A standardised Hindi with heavy Magahi substrate, and the register in which most of the region's public and commercial life is conducted.

Magadh UrduIndo-Aryan, Hindustani

Sustained by the khanqah and madrasa network at Bihar Sharif, Phulwari Sharif and Maner, with a literary history going back to Persian and Urdu writing at the Sufi centres.

Indigenous terminology

Term	Meaning
Sattu सत्तू	Roasted gram ground to flour. A drink, a stuffing and a meal, and the food that made long-distance labour migration survivable.
Ahar and pyne आहर / पइन	A three-sided embanked catchment and the contour channel that feeds it — an indigenous irrigation system, community-maintained, that predates any canal in the region.
Bhuja and bhunja भुजा / भुंजा	Grain roasted in hot sand, and the shop that roasts it to order while you wait.
Vihara विहार	A Buddhist monastery. There were so many here that the word became the name of the province and then of the state.
Pind daan पिंडदान	The offering of rice balls to the ancestors, performed at Gaya on behalf of the dead of one's line. Doing it at Gaya is held to complete the obligation permanently.
Gayawal गयावाल	The hereditary priestly community of Gaya who officiate at pind daan, each family holding rights over pilgrims from particular regions of India.
Bareja बरेजा	The shaded, humid bamboo-and-thatch enclosure in which Magahi paan is grown — a controlled microclimate maintained by hand.
Chokha चोखा	Roasted vegetables mashed with raw mustard oil, salt, onion and green chilli. Never cooked after mashing, which is what distinguishes it from bharta.
Tilkut तिलकुट	Literally pounded sesame — both the sweet and the beating that makes it.
Khanqah ख़ानक़ाह	A Sufi hospice and teaching establishment. The Firdausi khanqah at Bihar Sharif has been in continuous operation since the thirteenth century.

Sayings

Saying	Literally	Meaning
Jab tak sattu, tab tak hattu	While there is sattu, there is strength	A field worker's saying about the food that carries a day's labour.
Gaya gaye, pinda diye, kaam khatam	Went to Gaya, gave the offering, the work is finished	Said of any obligation discharged permanently — from the belief that pind daan performed at Gaya does not need repeating.
Ghar ke jogi jogna, aan gaon ke siddh	The ascetic at home is just an ascetic; the one from another village is a saint	Familiarity devalues; a proverb quoted in a region full of famous holy places nobody local visits.
Aage nath, peechhe pagha	A nose rope in front, a tether behind	Trapped from both sides — an agrarian image used for any impossible position.

Speech varieties, indigenous terminology and sayings of Magadh. (14)