In India, where sesame is cultivated since the Harappan period, there are two independent names for it: Sanskrit tila [तिल] appears alredy in the Rigveda and is the source of all names in North India, and some Southern Indian names also, e. g., Hindi, Urdu, Punjabi and Bengali til [तिल, تل, ਤਿਲ, তিল], Gujarati tal [તલ], Sinhala tala [තල] and Dhivehi thileyo [ތިލެޔޮ], but also Telugu tillu [తిలలు]. The origin of that word family is not known, but it often suspected to derive from a pre-Aryan Northern Indian language predating Sanskrit, perhaps related to the contemporary Munda languages. Yet there is a similar Akkadian term tallum meaning oil.