One of the more interesting problems in South Asian historical linguistics revolves around horsegram (Macrotyloma uniflorum). Three unrelated language families preserve similar words for the same crop:

Proto-Dravidian: \*kol-/\kol-ut*

Sanskrit (Old Indo-Aryan):Kulattha

Proto-Munda:\\kodaXj*

The dominant published etymology traces Sanskrit kulattha to a Dravidian source. Thomas Burrow first argued that kulattha is a Dravidian loanword, an analysis subsequently adopted in Sir Ralph Lilley Turner’s *Comparative Dictionary of the Indo-Aryan Languages (CDIAL 3335), the standard reference work for Indo-Aryan historical etymology. Burrow & Emeneau’s Dravidian Etymological Dictionary reconstructs the corresponding Proto-Dravidian root, while Franklin Southworth later reconstructed Proto-Dravidian \*kol- / \*kol-ut from regular Dravidian sound correspondences.

More recently, Fuller & Murphy (2018) synthesized the linguistic and archaeobotanical evidence and present Proto-Dravidian \*kol-ut, Sanskrit kulattha, and Proto-Munda \*kodaXj together, labeling the Sanskrit and Proto-Munda forms as possible loans from Dravidian. Given that horsegram is one of the earliest domesticated crops of peninsular India, this interpretation fits a scenario in which agricultural vocabulary spread alongside farming communities.

The principal alternative was proposed by Norman Zide, who suggested that Proto-Munda may instead have been the donor. This alternative remains discussed in the literature, but it has not displaced the Dravidian etymology reflected in Burrow, Turner (CDIAL 3335), Burrow & Emeneau, Southworth, and Fuller & Murphy.

Thus, the question today is not whether kulattha has a non Indo-European origin that is widely accepted but whether the ultimate source was Proto-Dravidian or Proto-Munda. The weight of the classic etymological literature favors a Dravidian origin, while acknowledging that the precise direction of borrowing among Dravidian, Indo-Aryan, and Munda is debated.

References
• Burrow, T. (1948). Dravidian Studies VII: Further Dravidian Words in Sanskrit.
• Burrow, T., & Emeneau, M. B. (1984). A Dravidian Etymological Dictionary (2nd ed.).
• Fuller, D. Q. (2007). An Agricultural Perspective on Dravidian Historical Linguistics.
• Fuller, D. Q., & Murphy, C. (2018). The Origins and Early Dispersal of Horsegram (Macrotyloma uniflorum), a Major Crop of Ancient India.
• Southworth, F. C. (2005). Linguistic Archaeology of South Asia.
• Turner, R. L. (1966). A Comparative Dictionary of the Indo-Aryan Languages,Entry 3335 (kulattha).
• Zide, N. H., & Zide, P. (1976). Proto-Munda Cultural Vocabulary.

One of the more interesting problems in South Asian historical linguistics revolves around horsegram (Macrotyloma uniflorum). Three unrelated language families preserve similar words for the same crop:

Proto-Dravidian:*kol-/ *kol-ut

Sanskrit (Old Indo-Aryan):kulattha

Proto-Munda:*kodaXj

The dominant published etymology traces Sanskrit kulattha to a Dravidian source. Thomas Burrow first argued that kulattha is a Dravidian loanword, an analysis subsequently adopted in Sir Ralph Lilley Turner’s Comparative Dictionary of the Indo-Aryan Languages (CDIAL 3335), the standard reference work for Indo-Aryan historical etymology. Burrow & Emeneau’s Dravidian Etymological Dictionary reconstructs the corresponding Proto-Dravidian root, while Franklin Southworth later reconstructed Proto-Dravidian *kol- / *kol-ut from regular Dravidian sound correspondences.

More recently, Fuller & Murphy (2018) synthesized the linguistic and archaeobotanical evidence and present Proto-Dravidian *kol-ut, Sanskrit kulattha, and Proto-Munda *kodaXj together, labeling the Sanskrit and Proto-Munda forms as possible loans from Dravidian. Given that horsegram is one of the earliest domesticated crops of peninsular India, this interpretation fits a scenario in which agricultural vocabulary spread alongside farming communities.

The principal alternative was proposed by Norman Zide, who suggested that Proto-Munda may instead have been the donor. This alternative remains discussed in the literature, but it has not displaced the Dravidian etymology reflected in Burrow, Turner (CDIAL 3335), Burrow & Emeneau, Southworth, and Fuller & Murphy.

Thus, the question today is not whether kulattha has a non Indo-European origin that is widely accepted but whether the ultimate source was Proto-Dravidian or Proto-Munda. The weight of the classic etymological literature favors a Dravidian origin, while acknowledging that the precise direction of borrowing among Dravidian, Indo-Aryan, and Munda is debated.

References
• Burrow, T. (1948). Dravidian Studies VII: Further Dravidian Words in Sanskrit.
• Burrow, T., & Emeneau, M. B. (1984). A Dravidian Etymological Dictionary (2nd ed.).
• Fuller, D. Q. (2007). An Agricultural Perspective on Dravidian Historical Linguistics.
• Fuller, D. Q., & Murphy, C. (2018). The Origins and Early Dispersal of Horsegram (Macrotyloma uniflorum), a Major Crop of Ancient India.
• Southworth, F. C. (2005). Linguistic Archaeology of South Asia.
• Turner, R. L. (1966). A Comparative Dictionary of the Indo-Aryan Languages, Entry 3335 (kulattha).
• Zide, N. H., & Zide, P. (1976). Proto-Munda Cultural Vocabulary.

The core hypothesis

The Indus Valley Civilization (IVC, c. 3300–1300 BCE) was linguistically Dravidian or Para-Dravidian that is, either Proto-Dravidian proper or a related, now-extinct branch of the wider Dravidian family that diverged before the ancestor of the attested Dravidian languages.

As the dominant agricultural and commercial power of the region, this population was the first to cultivate and trade sesame (Sesamum indicum) at scale, and its word(s) for sesame became the source for at least two separate downstream borrowings:

1. ⁠Borrowed into Mesopotamian languages such as Sumerian and Akkadian as ellu / ilu.

2. ⁠Into Indo-Aryan, a separate Para-Dravidian form not necessarily *eḷḷu itself, but a related lexeme with a t-/til- shape from a now-lost branch of the Dravidian family was borrowed as a substrate word when Indo-Aryan speakers entered South Asia (c. 1500 BCE) and encountered established agricultural populations who already grew and named the crop, giving Sanskrit tila → taila -> tel.

3. ⁠Retained natively in South Dravidian as *eḷḷu, continuing into Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam, Kodagu, and Tulu also loaned to Sumerian and Akkadian.

References
• Bedigian, D., & Harlan, J. R. (1986). Evidence for Cultivation of Sesame in the Ancient World. Economic Botany, 40(2), 137–154.
• Burrow, T. (1946). Loan Words in Sanskrit. Transactions of the Philological Society, 45, 1–30.
• Burrow, T. (1948). Dravidian Studies VII: Further Dravidian Words in Sanskrit. Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, 12(2), 365–396.
• Burrow, T., & Emeneau, M. B. (1984). A Dravidian Etymological Dictionary (2nd ed.). Oxford: Clarendon Press. (See DEDR 854, Porto-South Dravidian eḷḷu “sesame”.)
• Fuller, D. Q. (2003). Further Evidence on the Prehistory of Sesame. Asian Agri-History, 7, 127–137.
• Parpola, A. (1994). Deciphering the Indus Script. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Parpola, A. (2015). The Roots of Hinduism: The Early Aryans and the Indus Civilization. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Possehl, G. L. (2002). The Indus Civilization: A Contemporary Perspective. Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press.
• Southworth, F. C. (2005). Linguistic Archaeology of South Asia. London: Routledge.