Hindi
Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been de ...
: दोहा) is a form of self-contained rhyming
couplet
A couplet is a pair of successive lines of metre in poetry. A couplet usually consists of two successive lines that rhyme and have the same metre. A couplet may be formal (closed) or run-on (open). In a formal (or closed) couplet, each of the ...
in
poetry
Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings i ...
composed in
Mātrika metre ''Mātrika'' metre is a quantitative system of poetic metre in Indo-Aryan languages.
The unit of measurement is the '' mātrā'' or 'beat', from which it takes its name. A short vowel or a pause is counted as one ''mātrā'', and long vowels, dipht ...
. This genre of poetry first became common in Apabhraṃśa and was commonly used in
Hindustani language
Hindustani (; Devanagari: ,
*
*
*
* ; Perso-Arabic: , , ) is the '' lingua franca'' of Northern and Central India and Pakistan. Hindustani is a pluricentric language with two standard registers, known as Hindi and Urdu. Thus, the lan ...
poetry.{{Cite web, url=http://dsalsrv02.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/philologic/getobject.pl?c.4:1:1216.platts, title = Digital South Asia Library
Among the most famous dohas are those of
Sarahpa
Saraha, Sarahapa, Sarahapāda (or, in the Tibetan language མདའ་བསྣུན་, anün Wyl. mda' bsnun The Archer), (''circa'' 8th century CE) was known as the first sahajiya and one of the Mahasiddhas. The name ''Saraha'' means "the ...
,
Kabir
Kabir Das (1398–1518) was a 15th-century Indian mystic poet and saint. His writings influenced Hinduism's Bhakti movement, and his verses are found in Sikhism's scripture Guru Granth Sahib, the Satguru Granth Sahib of Saint Garib Das, ...
,
Mirabai
Meera, better known as Mirabai and venerated as Sant Meerabai, was a 16th-century Hindu mystic poet and devotee of Krishna. She is a celebrated Bhakti saint, particularly in the North Indian Hindu tradition.
Mirabai was born into a Rathore ...
,
Rahim
Rahim (''Raḥīm'' , also anglicized as Raheem) is one of the names of Allah in Islam, meaning "Merciful", from the root ''R-Ḥ-M''. It is also used as a personal male name, short for Abdu r-Raḥīm "Servant of the Merciful". Spellings include ...
,
Tulsidas
Tulsidas (; born Rambola Dubey; also known as Goswami Tulsidas; c.1511pp. 23–34.–1623) was a Ramanandi Vaishnava Hindu saint and poet, renowned for his devotion to the deity Rama. He wrote several popular works in Sanskrit and Awadhi, but ...
,
Surdas
Surdas (IAST: Sūr, Devanagari: सूर) was a 16th-century blind Hindu devotional poet and singer, who was known for his works written in praise of Krishna, the supreme lord. He was a Vaishnava devotee of Lord Krishna, and he was also a ...
A doha is a couplet consisting of two lines, each of 24 instants (
Matras Matras is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:
* Agnieszka Matras-Clement (born 1982), Polish and Canadian chess player
*Christian Matras (poet) (1900–1988), Faroese poet
* Christian Matras (cinematographer) (1903–1977), French c ...
). The rules for distinguishing light and heavy syllables is slightly different from
Sanskrit
Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...
. Each line has 13 instants in first part and 11 instants in the second. The first and third quarters of doha have 13 instants which must parse as 6-4-3.
Many Hindi poets have created several books which explain whole stories and
epics
The Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System (EPICS) is a set of software tools and applications used to develop and implement distributed control systems to operate devices such as particle accelerators, telescopes and other large sci ...
in the form of dohas. The most popular is Tulsidas' ''
Ramcharitmanas
''Ramcharitmanas'' ( deva, श्रीरामचरितमानस, Rāmacaritamānasa), is an epic poem in the Awadhi language, based on the ''Ramayana'', and composed by the 16th-century Indian bhakti poet Tulsidas (c. 1532–1623). This ...
'', a popular rendition of the Sanskrit epic ''
Ramayana
The ''Rāmāyana'' (; sa, रामायणम्, ) is a Sanskrit literature, Sanskrit Indian epic poetry, epic composed over a period of nearly a millennium, with scholars' estimates for the earliest stage of the text ranging from the 8th ...
''.
Examples
निन्द(३)क निय(३) रे (२) राखि(३)ए(२) आँगन (४) कुटी छ(४) वाय(३)> 13/11
बिनु पा(४)नी सा(४) बुन बि(३) ना(२) निर्मल (४) करे सु(४) भाय(३)> 13/11 arenthesized numbers indicate mAtraa-counts.Here is a Doha by Rahim:
जो रहीम उत्तम प्रकृति का कर सकत कुसंग ,
चन्दन विष व्यापत नहीं लिपटे रहत भुजंग , ,
''Says Rahim, one who is of inherently noble nature, will remain unaffected even when he associates with bad people.''
''The sandalwood plant does not absorb poison when the snakes wind around it.''
See also
*
Chaupai (poetry)
A chaupai (चौपाई) is a quatrain verse of Indian poetry, especially medieval Hindi poetry, that uses a metre of four syllables.
Famous chaupais include those of poet-saint Tulsidas (used in his classical text ''Ramcharitamanas'' and poem ...
*
Songs of realization
Songs of realization, or Songs of Experience (; Devanāgarī: दोहा; Romanized Sanskrit: ''Dohā''; Oriya: ପଦ), are sung poetry forms characteristic of the tantric movement in both Vajrayana Buddhism and in Hinduism. Doha is also a spe ...
*
Chhand (poetry)
''Chhand'' ( pa, ਛੰਦ , ur, چھند, hi, छंद) is a quatrain used in the poetic traditions of North India and Pakistan.
Chhands in culture
In the culture of the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent, it is customary for ''chh ...
*
Doha (Indian literature)
Doha is a lyrical verse-format which was extensively used by Indian poets and bards of North India probably since the beginning of the 6th century AD. Dohas of Kabir, Tulsidas, Raskhan, Rahim and the dohas of Nanak called Sakhis are famous. Satas ...
*
Hanuman Chalisa
The ''Hanuman Chalisa'' (; '' Forty chaupais on Hanuman'') is a Hindu devotional hymn (''stotra'') in praise of Hanuman.Rambhadradas 1984pp. 1–8./ref> It was authored by Tulsidas in the Awadhi language, and is his best known text apart from the ...