Old Bengali

Old Bengali
Adi Bangla
Page-39 of the Charyapada manuscript, a sign of the Old Bengali
Region	Bengal region
Ethnicity	Bengalis
Era	Mostly developed into Middle Bengali by the 14th century
Language family	Indo-European Indo-Iranian Indo-Aryan Eastern Indo-Aryan Bengali-Assamese Old Bengali
Early forms	Proto-Gauda–Kamarupa proto-Bengali (Gauda)
Writing system	Gaudi script
Language codes
ISO 639-3	–
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Old Bengali was the earliest recorded form of the Bengali language, spoken in the Bengal region of eastern Indian subcontinent during the Middle Ages. It developed from a Apabhraṃśa of Magadhi Prakrit around 650 AD, and the first Bengali literary works date from the 8th century. Between 1200 and 1350 AD, no written form or literary work of Bengali language is found; during this period the Islamic invasion took place in Bengal.^[1][2] It is marked as the barren age, and also marks the end of the Old Bengali era, as the Middle Bengali language developed later.

Old Bengali is an Indo-Aryan language that is one of the Eastern Indo-Aryan languages, and its closest relatives are Old Odia and Kamarupi Prakrit. Like other Old Eastern Indo-Aryan languages, it is distinct from Modern Bengali and is not fully incomprehensible to Modern Bengali speakers without study. Within Old Bengali grammar, the verb evolved and a letter is omitted from a ligature formed by consonants.