Semitic languages

The Semitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. They include Arabic, Amharic, Tigrinya, Tigre, Aramaic, Hebrew, Maltese, Modern South Arabian languages and numerous other ancient and modern languages. They are spoken by more than 460 million people across much of West Asia, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, Malta, and in large immigrant and expatriate communities in North America, Europe, and Australasia. The terminology was first used in the 1780s by members of the Göttingen school of history, who derived the name from Shem (שם), one of the three sons of Noah in the Book of Genesis. Since the 19th century, alternative names, such as Syro-Arabian languages, have been proposed and used. Arabic is by far the most widely spoken of the Semitic languages with 411 million native speakers of all varieties, and it is the most spoken native language in Africa and West Asia. Other Semitic languages include Amharic (35 million native speakers), Tigrinya (9.9 million speakers), Hebrew (5 million native speakers), Tigre (1 million speakers), and Maltese (570,000 speakers). Arabic, Amharic, Hebrew, Tigrinya, and Maltese are considered national languages with an official status. Semitic languages occur in written form from a very early historical date in West Asia, with East Semitic Akkadian (also known as Assyrian and Babylonian) and Eblaite texts (written in a script adapted from Sumerian cuneiform) appearing from c. 2600 BCE in Mesopotamia and the northeastern Levant respectively. The only earlier attested languages are Sumerian and Elamite (2800 BCE to 550 BCE), both language isolates, and Egyptian (c. 3000 BCE), a sister branch within the Afroasiatic family, related to the Semitic languages but not part of them. Amorite appeared in Mesopotamia and the northern Levant c. 2100 BCE, followed by the mutually intelligible Canaanite languages (including Hebrew, Phoenician, Moabite, Edomite, and Ammonite,...