This authoritative reference provides unique descriptions of 11 Dravidian languages, covering their historical development with discussions of their specialized linguistic structures and features. Each chapter combines modern linguistic theory with traditional historical linguistics and a uniform chapter structure allows for easy comparison between the individual languages. Two further chapters provide general information about the language family--the introduction covers the history, cultural implications and linguistic background, and a separate article on Dravidian writing systems. Written by a team of experts, each language chapter offers a detailed analysis of phonology, morpology, syntax and lexicon.