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The Canaanite languages, or Canaanite dialects,[1] are one of the three subgroups of the Northwest Semitic languages, the others being Aramaic and Ugaritic, all originating in the Levant and Mesopotamia. They are attested in Canaanite inscriptions throughout the Levant, Mesopotamia, Anatolia and the East Mediterranean, and after the founding of Carthage by Phoenician colonists, in coastal regions of North Africa and Iberian Peninsula also. Dialects have been labelled primarily with reference to Biblical geography: Hebrew (Israelian, Judean/Biblical, Samaritan), Phoenician/Punic, Amorite, Ammonite, Philistine, Moabite, Sutean and Edomite; the dialects were all mutually intelligible, being no more differentiated than geographical varieties of Modern English.[2] This family of languages has the distinction of being the first historically attested group of languages to use an alphabet, derived from the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, to record their writings, as opposed to the far earlier Cuneiform logographic/syllabic writing of the region, which originated in Mesopotamia.

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Canaanite
Geographic distribution	Levant, Carthage
Linguistic classification	Afro-Asiatic Semitic West Semitic Central Semitic Northwest Semitic Canaanite
Subdivisions	Ammonite † Moabite † Edomite † Phoenician † Punic † Hebrew (revived)
Glottolog	cana1267

These extremely closely related tongues were spoken by the ancient Semitic people of the Canaan and Levant regions, an area encompassing what is today Israel, Jordan, Sinai, Lebanon, Syria, the Palestinian territories and also some areas of southwestern Turkey (Anatolia), western and southern Iraq (Mesopotamia) and the north western corner of Saudi Arabia.

The Canaanites are broadly defined to include the Hebrews (including Israelites, Judeans and Samaritans), Amalekites, Ammonites, Amorites, Edomites, Ekronites, Hyksos, Phoenicians (including the Carthaginians), Moabites and Suteans. Although the Amorites are included among the Canaanite peoples, their language is sometimes not considered to be a Canaanite language but very closely related.

The Canaanite languages continued to be everyday spoken languages until at least the 2nd century AD. Hebrew is the only living Canaanite language today. It remained in continuous use by many Jews well into the Middle Ages and up to the present day as both a liturgical and literary language and was used for commerce between disparate diasporic Jewish communities. It has also remained a liturgical language among Samaritans. Hebrew was revived by Jewish political and cultural activists, particularly through the revitalization and cultivation efforts of Zionists throughout Europe and in Palestine, as an everyday spoken language in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. By the mid-20th century, Modern Hebrew had become the primary language of the Jews of Palestine and was later made the official language of the State of Israel.

The primary modern reference book for the many extra-biblical Canaanite inscriptions, together with Aramaic inscriptions, is the German-language book Kanaanäische und Aramäische Inschriften, from which inscriptions are often referenced as KAI n (for a number n).[3]

Classification and sources

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The Canaanite languages or dialects can be split into the following:[1][4]

North Canaan

• Phoenician (including Punic/Carthaginian). The main sources are the Ahiram sarcophagus inscription, the sarcophagus of Eshmunazar, the Tabnit sarcophagus, the Kilamuwa inscription, the Cippi of Melqart, and the other Byblian royal inscriptions. For later Punic: in Plautus' play Poenulus at the beginning of the fifth act.

South Canaan

• Ammonite – an extinct Hebraic dialect of the Ammonite people mentioned in the Bible.
• Edomite – an extinct Hebraic dialect of the Edomite people mentioned in the Bible and Egyptian texts.
• Hebrew – The only Canaanite language that is a living language, and the most successful example of a revived dead language.
• Moabite – an extinct Hebraic dialect of the Moabite people mentioned in the Bible. The main sources are the Mesha Stele and El-Kerak Stela.

Other

Other possible Canaanite languages:

• Philistine language – called as such to distinguish it from the assumed Indo-European elements of the broader Philistine language. The former is attested by several dozen inscriptions in Phoenician script scattered along Israel's southwest coast, in particular the Ekron Royal Dedicatory Inscription.
• Ugaritic, although the inclusion of this language within Canaanite is disputed^{[by whom?]}.
• The Deir Alla Inscription, written in a dialect with Aramaic and South Canaanite characteristics, which is classified as Canaanite in Hetzron.
• Sutean language, a Semitic language, possibly of the Canaanite branch.
• Amalekite, possibly a Hebraic dialect of southern Canaan.

Comparison to Aramaic

This section does not cite any sources. (January 2022)

Some distinctive typological features of Canaanite in relation to the still spoken Aramaic are:

• The prefix h- used as the definite article (Aramaic has a postfixed -a). That seems to be an innovation of Canaanite.
• The first person pronoun being ʼnk (אנכ anok(i) (which is similar to Akkadian, Ancient Egyptian and Berber) versus Aramaic ʼnʼ/ʼny'.
• The *ā > ō vowel shift (Canaanite shift).

Descendants

This section does not cite any sources. (August 2020)

Modern Hebrew, revived in the modern era from an extinct dialect of the ancient Israelites preserved in literature, poetry, liturgy; also known as Classical Hebrew, the oldest form of the language attested in writing. The original pronunciation of Biblical Hebrew is accessible only through reconstruction. It may also include Ancient Samaritan Hebrew, a dialect formerly spoken by the ancient Samaritans. The main sources of Classical Hebrew are the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh), and inscriptions such as the Gezer calendar and Khirbet Qeiyafa pottery shard. All of the other Canaanite languages seem to have become extinct by the early 1st millennium AD – except Punic, which survived into late antiquity, or possibly even longer.

Slightly varying forms of Hebrew preserved from the first millennium BC until modern times include:

• Tiberian Hebrew – Masoretic scholars living in the Jewish community of Tiberias in Palestine c. 750–950 AD.
• Mizrahi Hebrew – Mizrahi Jews, liturgical
• Yemenite Hebrew – Yemenite Jews, liturgical
• Sephardi Hebrew – Sephardi Jews, liturgical
• Ashkenazi Hebrew – Ashkenazi Jews, liturgical
• Mishnaic Hebrew (Rabbinical Hebrew) – Jews, liturgical, rabbinical, any of the Hebrew dialects found in the Talmud.
• Medieval Hebrew – Jews, liturgical, poetical, rabbinical, scientific, literary; lingua franca based on Bible, Mishna and neologisms forms created by translators and commentators
• Haskala Hebrew – Jews, scientific, literary and journalistic language based on Biblical but enriched with neologisms created by writers and journalists, a transition to the later
• Modern Hebrew used in Israel today
• Samaritan Hebrew – Samaritans, liturgical

The Phoenician and Carthaginian expansion spread the Phoenician language and its Punic dialect to the Western Mediterranean for a time, but there too it died out, although it seems to have survived longer than in Phoenicia itself.

See also

• Ancient Hebrew writings
• Canaanite and Aramaic inscriptions
• Classification of Semitic languages
• Northwest Semitic languages
• Shibboleth

References

Bibliography

• The Semitic Languages. Routledge Language Family Descriptions. Edited by Robert Hetzron. New York: Routledge, 1997.
• Garnier, Romain; Jacques, Guillaume (2012). "A neglected phonetic law: The assimilation of pretonic yod to a following coronal in North-West Semitic". Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies. 75 (1): 135–145. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.395.1033. doi:10.1017/s0041977x11001261. S2CID 16649580.
• Rendsburg, Gary (1997). "Ancient Hebrew Phonology". Phonologies of Asia and Africa: Including the Caucasus. Eisenbrauns. ISBN 978-1-57506-019-4.
• Waltke, Bruce K.; O'Connor, M. (1990). An Introduction to Biblical Hebrew Syntax. Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns. ISBN 978-0-931464-31-7.

External links

• Some West Semitic Inscriptions
• How the Alphabet Was Born from Hieroglyphs Biblical Archaeology Review

На других языках

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- [en] Canaanite languages

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[es] Lenguas cananeas

Las lenguas cananeas son una subfamilia de las lenguas semíticas que fueron habladas por los antiguos pueblos de la región de Canaán, incluyendo cananeos, hebreos, fenicios y filisteos. Todas ellas se extinguieron como lenguas nativas al principio del primer milenio de nuestra era, aunque el hebreo permaneció en el uso literario y religioso entre los judíos, y fue revivido como lengua habitual hablada en el siglo XIX por Eliezer Ben Yehuda. Los fenicios (y especialmente la expansión cartaginesa) difundieron su lengua cananea hacia el Mediterráneo occidental durante un tiempo, pero allí también desapareció, aunque parece haber sobrevivido algo más que en Fenicia misma.

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[fr] Langues cananéennes

Les langues cananéennes, ou dialectes cananéens[1], sont l'un des trois sous-groupes des langues sémitiques du Nord-Ouest, les autres étant l'araméen et l'ougaritique. Elles sont attestées par des inscriptions cananéennes dans toute la région méditerranéenne. Les dialectes ont été étiquetés principalement en référence à la géographie biblique : hébreu, phénicien / punique, amorrite, ammonite, éqronite, moabite et édomite; les dialectes étaient tous mutuellement intelligibles, n'étant pas plus différenciés que les variétés géographiques de l'anglais moderne[2]. Cette famille de langues a la particularité d'être le premier groupe de langues historiquement attesté à utiliser un alphabet, dérivé de l'alphabet proto-cananéen, pour enregistrer leurs écrits, par opposition à l'écriture logographique / syllabique cunéiforme bien plus ancienne de la région.

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[it] Lingue cananaiche

Le lingue cananee costituiscono un ramo delle lingue semitiche della famiglia lingue afroasiatiche parlate dagli antichi popoli della regione di Canaan.

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[ru] Ханаанские языки

Ханаанские языки (также ханаанейские[1]) — подсемья семитских языков, на которых говорили народы древнего Ханаана — евреи, амореи, моавитяне, эдумейцы, финикийцы и севера Африки — карфагеняне (потомки финикийских колонистов). Все эти языки перестали быть разговорными в начале нашей эры (когда умер пунический (финикийский) — неизвестно). Древнееврейский язык непрерывно оставался литературным и литургическим языком среди евреев и самаритян.

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