Deccani language

Deccani (دکنیdakanī) also known as Deccani Urdu, Deccani Hindi, or Deccani Hindustani is an Indo-Aryanlanguage variety based on a form of Hindustani spoken in the Deccan region of south-central India and is the native language of the Deccani people. The historical form of Deccani sparked the development of Urdu literature during the late-Mughal period. Deccani arose as a lingua franca under the Delhi Sultanate and Bahmani Sultanates, as trade and migration from the north introduced Hindustani to the Deccan. It later developed a literary tradition under the patronage of the Deccan Sultanates. Deccani itself came to influence standard Urdu and later modern standard Hindi.

Deccani has an Indo-Aryan core vocabulary, though it incorporated loanwords from Persian, which was the official language of the Deccan Sultanates. Additionally, Deccani differs from northern Hindustani sociolects due to archaisms retained from the medieval era, as well as a convergence with and loanwords from the Deccan's regional languages like Marathi, Kannada, Telugu, Tamil spoken in the states of Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, and Tamil Nadu. Deccani has been increasingly influenced by Standard Urdu, which serves as its formal register.

There are four primary dialects of Deccani spoken today: Hyderabadi, Bangalore Deccani, Aurangabadi Deccani, and Chennai Deccani.

The term "Deccani" and its variants are often used in two different contexts: a historical one, referring to the medieval-era literary predecessor of Hindi-Urdu; and an oral one, referring to the various Deccani dialects spoken in many areas of the Deccan today. Both contexts have intricate historical ties.