Tamil (, tami, m] ?) is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by Tamil people of South India, North-east Sri Lanka andSingapore.

[7] It has official status in the Indian states of Tamil Nadu and Puducherry. Tamil is also a national language of Sri Lanka and an official language of Singapore. It is also chiefly spoken in the states of Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Andaman and Nicobar Islands as one of the secondary languages. It is one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and was declared a classical language by thegovernment of India in 2004. [8] Tamil is also spoken by significant minorities in Malaysia, Canada, South [9] [10] [11] [12] Africa, Fiji, Germany, USA, Netherlands, Mauritius and Runion as well as emigrant communities around the world.

The earliest known Tamil inscriptions date back to at least 500 BC. The oldest literary text in Tamil, Tolkppiyam, was composed around 200 BC. The Tamil alphabet is is thought to have evolved from the Brahmi script, though some scholars believe that its origins go back to the Indus script. The alphabet is well suited to writing literary Tamil, centamil. However it is ill-suited to writing colloquial Tamil, koduntamil. During the 19th century, attempts were made to create a written version of the colloquial spoken language. Nowadays the colloquial written language appears mainly in school books and in passages of dialogue in fiction. The history of the Tamil language may conveniently be divided into three periods,

Early Tamil, comprising the period between the sixth century before and the sixth century after Christ; Mediaeval Tamil, between the sixth century and the twelfth century; and Modern Tamil, from the twelfth century down to the present day.

It is the eighteenth most spoken language, with over 80 million speakers worldwide.