Rajasthani languages in the context of "Hindustani classical music"

Alwar (Rajasthani Pronunciation: [əlʋəɾ]) is a city located in India's National Capital Region (NCR) and the administrative headquarters of Alwar District in the state of Rajasthan. It is located 150 km south of Delhi and 150 km north of Jaipur.

Marwar (Marwari: [maːɾwaːɽ], also called Jodhpur region, Marwari: [d͡ʒoːd̪ʱpʊɾ]) is a cultural and historical region in the western part of the Indian state of Rajasthan. The Thar Desert is located in this region of Rajasthan and stretches westward into Pakistan's Sindh province. The language of this region is known as Marwari, which is the most widely spoken dialect of the Rajasthani language.

In its most contracted definition, Marwar refers to the area governed by the erstwhile princely state of Jodhpur, comprising present-day districts of Jodhpur, Barmer, Jalore, Nagaur, and Pali. Although the former kingdoms of Bikaner and Jaisalmer were independent of the Marwar state, they are often included in the broader Marwar region due to geographical and cultural affinities.

Old Western Rājasthāni (also known as Maru-Gurjari, Old Gujarātī) is the common ancestor of the modern Gujarati and Western Rajasthani languages which developed from Sanskrit and the Prakrit Apabhraṃśas, and was spoken around 8-14th centuries in Western India. The literary form of Old Western Rājasthāni, the Dingala language was in use as early as the 12th century. While the spoken Old Western Rajasthani gave way to medieval forms of Western Rajasthani and Gujarati, it flourished in its literary form as Dingala till the 19th century.

Early texts of the language display characteristic features such as direct/oblique noun forms, postpositions, and auxiliary verbs. It had three genders, as Gujarati does today, and by around the time of 1300 CE, a fairly standardized form of this language emerged. The belief that modern Rajasthani sporadically expressed a neuter gender was based on the incorrect conclusion that the [ũ] that came to be pronounced in some areas for masculine [o] after a nasal consonant was analogous to Gujarati's neuter [ũ]. A formal grammar, Prakrita Vyakarana, of the precursor to this language, Gurjar Apabhraṃśa, was written by Jain monk and eminent scholar Acharya Hemachandra Suri in the reign of Chaulukya king Jayasimha Siddharaja of Anhilwara (Patan).

Mewar, also spelled as Mewad, is a historical region located in the south-eastern part of the Indian state of Rajasthan. It includes the present-day districts of Udaipur, Rajsamand, Bhilwara, Chittorgarh and Pratapgarh in Rajasthan. The language of this region is known as Mewari, one of the dialects of the Rajasthani language.