Tamil language

Tamil, also written as Thamizh, is a Dravidian language natively spoken by the Tamil people of South Asia. It is one of the longest-surviving classical language in India, attested since c. 300 BCE. The language belongs to the southern branch of the Dravidian language family and shares close ties with Malayalam and Kannada. Despite external influences, Tamil has retained a sense of linguistic purism, especially in formal and literary contexts.