Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature

Oral literature in the vernacular languages of India is of great antiquity, but it was not until about the 16th century that an extensive written literature appeared. Chief factors in this development were the intellectual and literary predominance of Sanskrit until then (except in S India, where a vast literature in Tamil was produced from ancient times) and the emergence of Hindu pietistic movements that sought to reach the people in their spoken languages. Among the Muslims classical Persian