Apabhrasa

Apabhrasa, also spelled Apabhraṃśa, is a historical term in Indo-Aryan linguistics used for the vernacular forms of late Prakrits that evolved into the modern languages of North, West, and parts of East India. The name, from Sanskrit for “deviated” or “imperfect speech,” signals its position as a transitional stage between classical Prakrits and later vernaculars. In scholarly practice, Apabhrasa encompasses a range of regional dialects attested from roughly the 6th to the 13th–14th centuries CE, with forms persisting into later centuries in some regions.

Apabhrasa literature is mainly religious and vernacular poetry, produced by Jain, Buddhist, and Hindu communities in northern and western India. It is viewed as the immediate ancestor of several modern Indo-Aryan languages, including Braj Bhasha, Awadhi, Gujarati, Marathi, and early Hindi-Urdu, though regional varieties diverged widely. The phase is characterized by a move away from the complex morphology of Prakrits toward more flexible syntax and vocabulary drawn from vernacular speech.

Linguistically, Apabhrasa exhibits phonological simplifications relative to Prakrits, looser inflection, mixed vocabulary including Sanskrit loanwords, and greater reliance on local forms. Writing in various local scripts, it documents a transition from formal Prakrit literary culture to regional vernacular literatures. The term remains a broad scholarly category, and not all researchers agree on a single language or uniform features.

Today, Apabhrasa is used mainly in philological and historical contexts to describe the genesis of many North Indian languages. It helps explain the emergence of standardized languages such as Hindi, Gujarati, Marathi, and their literary traditions from medieval vernaculars.