Early Urdu Conversation

Extract

It is natural that records of the beginnings of Urdu should be almost entirely confined to literature or quasi literature. Yet there are two classes of books which contain references to conversation; firstly, early lives of holy men (especially in the Deccan and Gujrat), whose followers wrote accounts of their sayings and doings, occasionally quoting actual words; secondly, histories such as those by Firishta and Abu'l FaẒl, in which we may find Urdu sentences spoken by emperors or kings. Urdu must often have been employed as the language of conversation in exalted circles even though the official language continued to be Persian.