RBSE SS Rajasthani Literature flashcards

32 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

Apabhramsha

The late Middle Indo-Aryan stage (roughly 6th-12th century CE) from which Rajasthani and Gujarati descended; its literary conventions shaped early Rajasthani metre and diction.

Maru-Gurjari

The common Old Gujarati-Rajasthani literary language of roughly the 8th to 14th centuries, ancestor of both modern Gujarati and the Rajasthani dialects.

Dingal

The heroic, terse literary register of Rajasthani cultivated by Charan poets, used for martial praise-poetry, genealogies, and battle narratives rather than everyday speech.

Pingal

The smoother, more Sanskritised Rajasthani literary register used by Brahmin and Jain poets for devotional, didactic, and narrative verse, contrasted with the heroic Dingal.

Charan tradition

A hereditary community of bards and chroniclers attached to Rajput courts who composed Dingal praise-poetry, maintained genealogies, and served as diplomats and battle recorders.

Bhat tradition

Genealogist-panegyrists who preserved vamshavali lineage records and recited heroic and ritual verse at courts, distinct from but overlapping with the Charan bardic tradition.

Mira Bai

Sixteenth-century Krishna-bhakti poet whose padas in Marwari-Mewari and Braj express viraha, total surrender, and defiance of social convention; a central figure of Rajasthani devotion.

Dadu Dayal

Sixteenth-century nirguna sant and founder of the Dadu-panth, whose Sakhi and Pada collections combine devotional yearning with ethical, anti-ritual teaching.

Sundardas

Dadu-panthi poet (1596-1689) who wrote Sundar Vilas and Ram Charitra, blending nirguna devotion with Rama narrative in Rajasthani verse.

Nainsi ri Khyat

The seventeenth-century prose chronicle by Munhot Nainsi covering Marwar's rulers and also recording castes, customs, and administration; the foundational work of Rajasthani khyat literature.

Vigat

A prose genre recording pargana-wise revenue, land measures, and topography; Nainsi's Vigat documents Marwar's administrative geography and is a key historical source.

Khyat characterisation

Rulers in khyat prose are drawn typologically through valour, generosity, and statecraft, using stock epithets rather than psychological depth; moral exemplarity outweighs realism.

Viyoga shringar

The rasa of love-in-separation, the dominant sentiment of Mira's padas, where longing for Krishna is expressed through imagery of night, loneliness, and the absent beloved.

Upama alankara

Simile: an explicit comparison using words such as 'like' or 'as', as in comparing a warrior to a lion; one of the most frequent figures in Dingal heroic verse.

Bhavartha

The prose paraphrase of a verse: first the literal meaning, then the implied devotional or heroic sentiment, stated as the poem's overall purport.

Khanda-kavya

A short narrative poem treating a single episode or 'section' of a larger story, as opposed to a full mahakavya; a recognised Rajasthani and Sanskrit genre category.

Muktak

A self-contained short verse, usually a couplet or quatrain, complete in itself and independent of any surrounding narrative, often ending with a turn of meaning.

Doha metre

A two-line couplet metre with thirteen matras in the first line and eleven in the second, widely used for maxims, riddles, and narrative verse in Rajasthani.

Premakhyan

A narrative love-tale genre, exemplified by Dhola-Maru, in which the romance of the hero and heroine structures the poem and provides its emotional centre.

Three-gender system

Rajasthani retains masculine, feminine, and neuter genders in many dialects, unlike standard Hindi's two genders, affecting adjective and participle agreement in translation.

Genitive ro/ri/ra

The Rajasthani genitive postposition agrees with the possessed noun: mharo beta (my son), mhari beti (my daughter), mhara ghar (my house).

Honorific pronouns

Rajasthani distinguishes politeness levels: aap (respectful), tam (familiar), and thu (intimate or derogatory); thu must never address elders in translation exercises.

Idiom translation rule

Rajasthani idioms must be rendered by sense rather than word-for-word; for example 'aankh ro andho' means wilfully blind, not literally eyeless.

Pabuji ki Phad

A heroic folk epic of Rajasthan performed by Bhopa and Bhopi singers to the ravanhatta fiddle while unrolling a painted phad scroll depicting Pabuji's deeds.

Dhola-Maru

A celebrated Rajasthani folk love-epic (premakhyan) recounting the romance and elopement of Dhola and Maru; sung widely in Marwar and Mewar.

Tejaji

A folk hero-deity of Rajasthan worshipped for protection against snakebite; his phad and fair at Parbatsar celebrate his sacrifice and curing power.

Gogaji

A folk snake-deity of Rajasthan and neighbouring regions, invoked against snakebite and celebrated in the Gogamedi fair; his legend blends Rajput and Nath traditions.

Ramdevji

A folk saint-deity of western Rajasthan, called Kamad or the wish-granter, venerated especially by marginalised communities for protection and social justice.

Mandana

A Rajasthani folk wall- and floor-painting tradition of geometric and floral motifs, made by women on mud walls and thresholds during festivals.

Kavad

A foldable wooden shrine-box painted with narrative panels, used by itinerant storytellers in Rajasthan to unfold episodes of folk and devotional tales.

Suryamall Mishran

Nineteenth-century Pingal scholar-poet, author of Vansh Bhaskar, who systematised Rajasthani poetics and chronicled Rajput lineages in Sanskritised verse.

Bankidas ri Khyat

An early nineteenth-century chronicle by Kaviraj Bankidas continuing the khyat tradition with a more anecdotal, literary style than Nainsi's administrative prose.