LIST OF LANGUAGES BY FIRST WRITTEN ACCOUNTS

:''"Ancient Language" redirects here. For other uses, see ancient language (disambiguation)''.
This is a 'list of languages by first written accounts' which consists of the approximate dates for the ''first written accounts'' that are known for various ''languages''.
Because of the way languages change gradually, it is usually impossible to pinpoint when a given language began to be spoken with any precision. In many cases, some form of the language had already been spoken (and even written) considerably earlier than the dates of the earliest extant samples provided here.
There are also various claims regarding still-undeciphered scripts without wide acceptance, which, if substantiated, would push backward the first attestation of certain languages.
A written record may encode a stage of a language corresponding to an earlier time — either as a result of oral tradition, or because the earliest source is a copy of an older manuscript that was lost. Oral tradition of epic poetry may typically bridge a few centuries, but in rare cases, over a millennium. An extreme case is the Vedic Sanskrit of the Rigveda: the earliest parts of this text are dated to ca. 1500 BC, while the oldest known manuscript dates to the 11th century AD, corresponding to a gap of approximately 2,500 years.
For languages that have developed out of a known predecessor, dates provided here are subject to conventional terminology. For example, Old French developed gradually out of Vulgar Latin, and the Oaths of Strasbourg (842) listed are the earliest text that is classified as "Old French". Similarly, Danish and Swedish separate from common Old East Norse in the 12th century, while Norwegian separates from Old West Norse around 1300.

Contents
Before 1000 BC
1st millennium BC
1st millennium AD
1000-1500 AD
After 1500 AD
Constructed languages
References
See also

Before 1000 BC



Sumerian - ''c.'' 3450 BC: Ideographic tablets from the temple archives in Uruk[1][2]

Egyptian - ''c.'' 3320 BC: A collection of labels from tomb Uj, perhaps belonging to King Scorpion, in the Umm el-Qa'ab[3][2]

Eblaite - ''c.'' 2400 BC

Akkadian - ''c.'' 2300 BC

Elamite - ''c.'' 2250 BC: Awan dynasty peace treaty with Naram-Sin

West Semitic / proto-Canaanite - ''c.'' 1800 BC: Middle Bronze Age alphabets

Luwian - ''c.'' 1800 BC

Hittite - ''c.'' 1650 BC: Various cuneiform texts and Palace Chronicles written during the reign of Hattusili I, from the archives at Hattusas

Minoan - ''c.'' 1600 BC: Linear A

Canaanite - ''c.'' 1500 BC: Proto-Canaanite alphabet

Greek - ''c.'' 1450 BC

Chinese - ''c.'' 1300 BC: Oracle bone script[5]

Ugaritic - ''c.'' 1300 BC

1st millennium BC



Aramaic - ''c.'' 950 BC

Hebrew - ''c.'' 950 BC: Gezer calendar

Phrygian - ''c.'' 800 BC

Moabite - ''c.'' 800 BC

Ammonite - ''c.'' 800 BC

Old South Arabian - ''c.'' 800 BC

Etruscan - ''c.'' 700 BC

Umbrian - ''c.'' 600 BC

North Picene - ''c.'' 600 BC

Lepontic - ''c.'' 600 BC

Tartessian - ''c.'' 600 BC

Lydian - ''c.'' 600 BC

Carian - ''c.'' 600 BC

Persian - ''c.'' 525 BC: Old Persian cuneiform script

Latin - ''c.'' 500 BC: Duenos Inscription[6]

South Picene - ''c.'' 500 BC

Ge'ez - ''c.'' 500 BC

Messapian - ''c.'' 500 BC

Gaulish - ''c.'' 500 BC

Old North Arabian - ''c.'' 500 BC

Mixe-Zoque - ''c.'' 500 BC: Isthmian script (disputed)

Oscan - ''c.'' 400 BC

Iberian - ''c.'' 400 BC

Meroitic - ''c.'' 300 BC

Faliscan - ''c.'' 300 BC

Volscian - ''c.'' 275 BC

Sanskrit/Prakrit - ''c.'' 250 BC: Edicts of Ashoka

Galatian - ''c.'' 200 BC

Tamil - ''c.'' 200 BC[7]

Celtiberian - ''c.'' 100 BC

1st millennium AD


''(This list is incomplete.You can help by expanding it!)''

Bactrian - - ''c.'' 150: Rabatak inscription

Common Germanic/Proto-Norse - ''c.'' 160: Vimose inscriptions

Cham - ''c.'' 200

Maya - ''c.'' ''200''

Basque - ''c.'' 300: Iruña-Veleia archaeological site

Gothic - ''c.'' 300: Gothic runic inscriptions; Codex Argenteus

Primitive Irish - ''c.'' 300-400: Ogham inscriptions

Georgian - ''c.'' 430: a Georgian church in Bethlehem

Kannada - ''c.'' 450: Halmidi inscription

West Germanic - 6th century (Old Low Franconian - ''c.'' 510: Salic law[8]; Old High German - ''c.'' 550: Pforzen buckle; Old English - Undley bracteate; ''c.'' 650: Franks Casket; West Heslerton brooch[9])

Arabic - 512: pre-Islamic Arabic inscriptions

Cambodian - ''c.'' 600

Tibetan - ''c.'' 600

Udi - ''c.'' 600: Mount Sinai palimpsest M13

Telugu - 620

Malay - ''c.'' 683

Tocharian - ''c.'' 700

Old Turkic - ''c.'' 700 Orkhon

Japanese - ''c.'' 700

Welsh - ''c.'' 700: Tywyn inscriptions

Frisian - ''c.'' 750

Hindi - 769: ''Dohakosh'' by Saraha

Malayalam - ''c.'' 800

Javanese - 804

Old French - ''c.'' 842: Oaths of Strasbourg

Bengali Language -''c.'' 900 charyapada

Russian - ''c.'' 950-1000: Gnezdovo inscription, Birch bark documents, Novgorod Codex

Italian - ''c.'' 960-963: [10]

Old Church Slavonic - 993: Inscription on a gravestone erected by Tsar Samuil of Bulgaria[11]

1000-1500 AD


''(This list is incomplete.You can help by expanding it!)''

Slovenian - 972-1093: (Freising manuscripts)

Hungarian - c. 1000: the Charter of the Nuns of Veszprémvölgy

Balinese - ''c.''1000

Ossetic - ''c.'' 1000

Catalan - ''c.'' 1028: Jurament Feudal[12]

Piedmontese - 1080

Aragonese and Spanish - centuries X-XI: Glosas Emilianenses (date from )

Croatian - ''c.'' 1100: Baška tablet

Danish - ''c.'' 1100

Swedish - ''c.'' 1100

Tagalog -''c.'' 1100: Laguna Copperplate Inscription

Nepal Bhasa - 1114: "The Palmleaf from Uku Bahal"

Middle Dutch - ''c.'' 1150: [13]

Portuguese and/or Galician - 1189

Bosnian - 1189: The Charter of Kulin

Czech - ''c.'' 1200-1230

Western Lombard - ''c.'' 1250: Sordello da Goito, "Sirventese lombardesco"

Polish - ''c.'' 1270: Book of Henryków

Yiddish - 1272

Thai - ''c.'' 1292

Old Norwegian - ''c.'' 1300

Batak - ''c.''1300

Philippine languages - ''c.'' 1300

Finnic - ''c.'' 1300 Birch bark letter no. 292 (Finnish proper: Abckiria, 1543)

Old Prussian - ''c.'' 1350

Kashmiri - ''c.'' 1350

Komi - 1372

Albanian - ''c.'' 1400

Korean - 1446 (Hunmin Jeongeum)

Maltese language - ''c.'' 1470: Cantilena

After 1500 AD


Date Language Attestation Notes
1521 Romanian Neacşu's letter.
1530 Latvian
1535 Estonian
1539 Classical Nahuatl ''Breve y mas compendiosa doctrina cristiana en lengua mexicana y castellana'' Possibly the first printed book in the New World. No copies are known to exist today.[14]
1543 Modern Finnish ''Abckiria'' by Mikael Agricola.
1545 Lithuanian
ca. 1550 New Dutch/Standard Dutch Statenbijbel The Statenbijbel is commonly accepted to be the start of Standard Dutch, but various experiments were performed around 1550 in Flanders and Brabant. Although none proved to be lasting they did create a semi-standard and many formed the base for the Statenbijbel.
1554 Wastek A grammar by Andrés de Olmos.
1600 Buginese
ca. 1650 Ubykh The Seyahatname of Evliya Çelebi.
1692 Sakha (Yakut)
ca. 1695 Seri Grammar and vocabulary compiled by Adamo Gilg. No longer known to exist.[15]
1728 Swahili ''Utendi wa Tambuka''
1743 Chinese Pidgin English
1770 Guugu Yimithirr Words recorded by James Cook's crew.
1819 Cherokee
ca. 1830 Vai
1832 Gamilaraay Basic vocabulary collected by Thomas Mitchell.[16]
ca. 1900 Papuan languages
ca. 1900 Other Austronesian languages.
1903 Lingala
1984 Gooniyandi

Constructed languages


Date Language Attestation Notes
1879 Volapük An artificial language created by Johann Martin Schleyer.
1887 Esperanto ''Unua Libro'' An artificial language created by L. L. Zamenhof.
1907 Ido An artificial language based on Esperanto.
1917 Quenya An artificial language created by J. R. R. Tolkien.
1929 Novial An artificial language created by Otto Jespersen.
1935 Sona ''Sona, an auxiliary neutral language'' An artificial language created by Kenneth Searight.
1951 Interlingua Interlingua-English Dictionary An artificial language created by the International Auxiliary Language Association.
1955 Loglan An artificial language created by James Cooke Brown.
1985 Klingon An artificial language created by Marc Okrand.
1987 Lojban An artificial language based on Loglan created by the Logical Language Group.

References


1. Some Problems for Mesopotamian Archaeology
2. Writing Gets a Rewrite
3. The oldest writings, and inventory tags of Egypt
4. Writing Gets a Rewrite
5. William G. Boltz, Early Chinese Writing, ''World Archaeology'', Vol. 17, No. 3, Early Writing Systems. (Feb., 1986), pp. 420-436 (436)
6. A Note on the Duenos Inscription
7. Iravatham Mahadevan (2003). Early Tamil Epigraphy from the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D. Cambridge, Harvard University Press. ( (excerpt , review )
8. Onze Taal
9. Oldest written English?
10. History of the Italian language.
11. Old Church Slavonic Online: Series Introduction
12. Primers textos de la llengua catalana, MORAN, J. i J. A. RABELLA (ed.), , , Proa (Barcelona), 2001, ISBN 84-8437-156-5
13. Various texts, among whom the Servaaslegende by Henderik van de Veldeke
14. A Catalogue of Pre-1840 Nahuatl Works Held by The Lilly Library, Schwaller, John Frederick, , , The Indiana University Bookman, 1973
15.
16. Austin, Peter K. The Gamilaraay (Kamilaroi) Language, northern New South Wales — A Brief History of Research

See also



List of inventors of writing systems

Genealogy of scripts derived from Proto-Sinaitic

Undeciphered writing systems

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