On Sun, Aug 31, 2003 at 10:51:43PM -0700, Suraj wrote:
Malayalam being a tamil + sanskrit derivate is bound to have a lot of things in common with Tamil / sanskrit and hence I think there is no point in trying to find "pure" malayalam words.
Dear Suraj, RMS was asking for the Sanskrit equivalent of Kappam, so I was telling in Malayalam also it is same, "Kappam". I don't know in Sanskrit what is the equivalent word. (is there a word called "Nikuthi" in Sanskrit. It is for Tax in Malayalam. Kappam also is some sort of Tax).
FYI, old Malyalam was derived from Tamil and Sanskrit. But later Thunchathu Ezhuthachan (Father of Malyalam) purified Malayalam a lot.
For eg: "Thanta" is Father as per old Malayalam. But now it is called "Achan" (in Tamil it is Appa). Calling our father "Thanta" is considered as *bad* now. Similary "Thalla" is now "Amma".
Regards