Indo-Aryan is the largest branch of the Indo-Iranian family, itself part of Indo-European, comprising languages spoken across South Asia. Its members include Hindi, Bengali, Punjabi, Marathi, Gujarati and Urdu, together spoken natively by well over a billion people, making Indo-Aryan one of the largest branches of Indo-European by speaker count.
Facts
RegionEast of the Indus River in South Asia, spanning eastern Pakistan, northern India, southern Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and the Maldives 1 Speaker Count Proto-Language StatusReconstructed as Proto-Indo-Aryan (also called Proto-Indic), intended to represent the language of the pre-Vedic Indo-Aryans 1 Connections
Ancestor Of
Gujarati languages are usually placed in the Western Indo-Aryan subgroup within Indo-Aryan; no Western Indo-Aryan entity exists live in this atlas, so this edge links directly to the broader Indo-Aryan family, one rank higher than the ideal placement. A future mint of Western Indo-Aryan languages should re-parent this edge.
Descends From
Indo-Aryan, grouping Hindi-Urdu, Bengali, Punjabi and their relatives, is one of the two main branches of Indo-Iranian alongside Iranian.
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Indo-Aryan Languages
WikipediaLead section, paragraph 1: geographic distribution sentence
As of the early 21st century, there were 800 million speakers, primarily concentrated east of the Indus River in South Asia, spread across Eastern Pakistan, Northern India, southern Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Maldives.
Lead section, paragraph 1: speaker total sentence
As of the early 21st century, there were 800 million speakers, primarily concentrated east of the Indus River in South Asia, spread across Eastern Pakistan, Northern India, southern Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Maldives.
Proto-Indo-Aryan section: reconstruction statement
Proto-Indo-Aryan (or sometimes Proto-Indic) is the reconstructed proto-language of the Indo-Aryan languages. It is intended to reconstruct the language of the pre-Vedic Indo-Aryans.
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