Divu (from Sanskrit द्वीप dvīpa, 'island') later became ދޫ dū, which is currently present in many names of Maldivian islands, such as Hanimādū, Mīdū, and Dāndū.

[11] The following are some phonological features shared by Sinhala, or unique to Maldivian:[8] The earliest official writings were on the lōmāfānu (copper-plate grants) of the 12th and 13th centuries.

[13] There is a holiday, the Dhivehi Language Day, which is celebrated in the Maldives on 14 April, the birthday of the writer Husain Salahuddin.

The Maldivian language has multiple dialects due to the wide distribution of the islands, causing differences in pronunciation and vocabulary to develop during the centuries.

The most divergent dialects of the language are to be found in the southern atolls, namely Huvadhu, Fuvahmulah and Addu.

The letter Ṇaviyani (ޱ), which represented the retroflex n sound common to many Indic languages (Gujarati, Hindi, etc.

[15] Ṇaviyani's former position in the Thaana alphabet, between the letters Gaafu and Seenu, is today occupied by the palatal nasal Ñaviyani (ޏ).

According to Sonja Fritz, "the dialects of Maldivian represent different diachronial stages in the development of the language.

Especially in the field of morphology, the amount of archaic features steadily increase from the north to the south.

Within the three southernmost atolls (of the Maldives), the dialect of the Addu islands which form the southern tip of the whole archipelago is characterized by the highest degree of archaicity".

Maldivian presents another aspect with which English speakers are not too familiar: diglossia, the distinction between what is spoken and what is written.

Sukun in general is a mark to indicate an abrupt stop (vowel deletion) on the sound of the letter on which it is placed.

These ancient Maldivian letters were also used in official correspondence with Addu Atoll until the early 20th century.

Today Maldivians rarely learn the Dhives Akuru alphabet, for Arabic is favoured as the second script.

It has three different purposes: It can act as a carrier for a vowel, that is, a word-initial vowel or the second part of a diphthong; when it carries a sukun, it indicates gemination of the following consonant; and if alifu+sukun occurs at the end of a word, it indicates that the word ends in a glottal stop.

IAST transliteration is also sometimes used, and also the Devanāgarī script (almost never used in Maldives, but used in Minicoy[18]) Towards the mid-1970s, during President Ibrahim Nasir's tenure, the Maldivian government introduced telex machines in the local administration.

Clarence Maloney, an American anthropologist who was in the Maldives at the time of the change, lamented the inconsistencies of the "Dhivehi Latin" which ignored all previous linguistic research on the Maldivian language done by H.C.P.

Standard Indic is a consistent script system that is well adapted to writing almost all languages of South Asia.

ISO 15919 has been used by Xavier Romero-Frias to romanize Maldivian in his book The Maldive Islanders - A Study of the Popular Culture of an Ancient Ocean Kingdom.

The nominal system of Maldivian comprises nouns, pronouns, adjectives and numerals as parts of speech.

The Maldivian verbal system is characterised by a derivational relationship between active, causative and involitive/intransitive verb forms.

If the loanword refers to a person, the following suffixes can be used: Among some of the most common words of this kind are the following: actor (ektaru), agent (ejentu), ambassador (embesedaru), architect (aakitektu), bodyguard (bodeegaadu), cashier (keyshiyaru), director (direktaru, dairektaru), doctor (daktaru), driver (duraivaru), guard (gaadu), inspector (inspektaru), manager (meneyjaru), minister (ministaru), operator (opareytaru), producer (purodiusaru), sergeant (saajentu), servant (saaventu) If the loanword refers to a thing, the suffixes are Some of the most commonly used words of this kind are the following: bicycle (baisikalu), bill (bilu), cable (keybalu), cake (keyku), coat (koatu), counter (kauntaru), parcel (paarisalu/paarusalu), ticket (tiketu) If the loanword refers to some kind of action, the Maldivian word kure (present), kuranee (present continuous), koffi (present perfect), kuri (past) or kuraane (future) is added after it, if it is done intentionally, and ve (present), vanee (present continuous), vejje (present perfect), vi (past) and vaane (future) is added after it, if it happens to be unintentional or passive.

For example, using kensal "cancel": Some examples: Inherent in the Maldivian language is a form of elaborate class distinction expressed through three levels: The highest level, the maaiy bas, formerly used to address members of the royal family, is now commonly used to show respect.

After the arrival of Islam in South Asia, Persian and Arabic made a significant impact on Maldivian.

English words are also commonly used in the spoken language, for example "phone", "note", "radio", and soatu ("shorts").

There is a small amount of Portuguese and English loanwords too, owing to colonialism and limited Western exposure.

The following is a sample text in Maldivian, Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (by the United Nations): މާއްދާ 1 - ހުރިހާ އިންސާނުން ވެސް އުފަންވަނީ، ދަރަޖަ އާއި ޙައްޤު ތަކުގައި މިނިވަންކަމާއި ހަމަހަމަކަން ލިބިގެންވާ ބައެއްގެ ގޮތުގައެވެ.

Romanization (ISO 15919): Gloss (word-for-word): Translation (grammatical): Founded in 1984, the Mahal Unit Press at Minicoy prints texts in Maldivian, among other languages.

The press also publishes the Lakshadweep Times in three languages on a regular basis: Maldivian, English and Malayalam.

Activities: Freely downloadable open-source Unicode typefaces featuring Thaana letters include FreeSerif and MPH 2B Damase.