Devanagari or Nagari

Nagari (नागरी) and Devanagari (देवनागरी) both the words are used to address the same script. This script - 'DevaNagari' is used for writing Hindi, Sanskrit, Marathi, Nepali and many other scripts of south asia (particularly India). Which word (Nagari or Devanagari) should be used can not be a subject of debate!

Few scholars use the word 'Nagari' to represent an older form of the script. I don't agree. In most of the dictionaries both the words are defined to be synonyms.

The information given here is not necessary for someone who wish to learn Nagari, oops DevaNagari. If you like to know more about Deva/Nagari/Hindi read on...

'Kashi Nagari Pracharini Sabha' was a great (but small) organisation. It was formed for the promotion of the DevaNagari script and Hindi. At the end of 19th century the 'Sabha' resolved to publish a big Hindi dictionary in DevaNagari. Their research team collected a lot of Hindi words (over 20 years!) from various sources. The result was 'Shabda Sagar' (शब्द सागर / sea of words).

The research team was led by the editor Shyamsundardas. There were five assistant editors - Balkrishna Bhatta, Ramchandra Shukla, AmeerSinh, Jagmohan Varmma and Bhagwandeen. Apart from this team there were others who collected words from every possible source. Particularly Munshi Ramlaganlal collected lots of words by talking to people involved in different trades.

By any measure, 'Shabda Sagar', is a great dictionary of Hindi. Its second edition was published in 1924. The second edition contains 93115 words in 3999 pages spanning eight volumes. It also contains lot of information about Nagari and Hindi.

As 'Kashi Nagari Pracharini Sabha' used the word 'Nagari' instead of 'Devanagari' in its title, we can say that the word 'Nagari' was in use in the late 19th century and in the beginning of 20th century.

According to 'Shabda Sagar' also, both the words are synonyms. In 'Shabda Sagar' under the word 'Nagari' they mentioned to refer to 'Devanagari'. It described the script under the word 'Devanagari' in great details and every time they used the word 'Nagari'. This dictionary also published Shri Ozha's chart showing evolution of Nagari from 'Brahmi'.

The word Nagari (नागरी) seems to have been derived from the word 'Nagar' (नागर). 'Naga' in 'Nagar' rhymes with the English word 'saga' and the 'r' is clearly pronounced. According to 'Shabda Sagar', 'Nagar' means 'related to city' and 'which lives in city'.

IMHO, as information and knowledge is at the core of a civilization and a script is used to preserve it. So, the word Nagari might have been used for a meaning like 'a thing related to civilization'.

In some dictionaries 'Nagari' is described simply as 'script of city'. City is ‘नगर’ and not ‘नागर’. In Sanskrit & Hindi, Dev means 'God' or something divine. The Oxford Concise Dictionary describes Devanagari as 'script of divine city'. I don't agree. IMHO, the word 'Nagari' is older and 'Dev' was added afterwards (just) to show respect!

Some relate this word with 'Nagar Brahmins' (a caste of priests).

To read about other alternate spellings like devnagari click here.

Please let me know if I made any mistake in the above text. This text is written by me without any help from any web-page, book or article except the second edition of the 'Shabda Sagar'. - Akhilesh Gupta