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:''"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