List of languages by first written accounts
This is a list consisting of the approximate dates of 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.
Before 1000 BC
- Sumerian - c. 3400 BC–3100 BC: Ideographic tablets from the temple archives in Uruk[1]
- Egyptian - c. 3400 BC–3200 BC: A collection of labels from tomb Uj, perhaps belonging to King Scorpion, in the Umm el-Qa'ab[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[3]
- 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[4]
- South Picene - c. 500 BC
- Ge'ez - c. 500 BC
- Messapian - c. 500 BC
- Gaulish - 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 - c. 250 BC: Edicts of Ashoka
- Prakrit - c. 250 BC: Edicts of Ashoka
- Galatian - c. 200 BC
- Tamil - c. 200 BC[5][6][7]
- Old North Arabian - c. 200 BC
- Celtiberian - c. 100 BC
1st millennium AD
(This list is incomplete.You can help by expanding it!)
- Bactrian - - c. 150: Rabatak inscription
- 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
- Georgian - c. 430: a Georgian church in Bethlehem
- Kannada - c. 450: Halmidi inscription
- Primitive Irish - c. 500: Ogham inscriptions
- Old Dutch - c. 510: Salic law[8]
- Arabic - 512: pre-Islamic Arabic inscriptions
- Old High German - c. 550: Pforzen buckle
- Cambodian - c. 600
- Tibetan - c.: 600
- Udi - c.: 600: Mount Sinai palimpsest M13
- Old English - c. 650: Franks Casket; West Heslerton brooch[9]
- 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
- Spanish - c. 804
- Old French - c. 842: Oaths of Strasbourg (mixture of vulgar Latinic Romance and Frankish)
- Bengali Language -c. 900 charyapada
- Old Church Slavonic - c. 950
- Italian - c. 960-963: [10]
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[11]
- Piedmontese - 1080
- 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: [12]
- Portuguese - 1189
- Bosnian - 1189: The Charter of Kulin
- Galician - 1189
- Czech - c. 1200-1230
- Insubric - 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
- Russian - c. 1300-1350
- 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
See also
- List of inventors of writing systems
- Genealogy of scripts derived from Proto-Sinaitic
- Undeciphered writing systems
Citations
- [1] http://www.csun.edu/~ms44278/sumer.htm, Shupp, Mike, Some Problems for Mesopotamian Archaeology.
- [2] http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3657/is_200206/ai_n9107461, Mattessich, Richard, The oldest writings, and inventory tags of Egypt, The Accounting Historians Journal, 2002-06.
- [3] William G. Boltz, Early Chinese Writing, World Archaeology, Vol. 17, No. 3, Early Writing Systems. (Feb., 1986), pp. 420-436 (436)
- [4] http://www.humnet.ucla.edu/pies/pdfs/IESV/1/BV_Duenos.pdf, Vine, Brent, A Note on the Duenos Inscription.
- [5] Iravatham Mahadevan (2003). Early Tamil Epigraphy from the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D. Cambridge, Harvard University Press.
- [6] Excerpt from the book ''Early Tamil Epigraphy from the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D.'' by I.Mahadevan, Iravatham Mahadevan.
- [7] Review of the book ''Early Tamil Epigraphy from the Earliest Times to the Sixth Century A.D.'' by I.Mahadevan, The Hindu review.
- [8] Onze Taal, Livios.org.
- [9] Oldest written English?, Cronaca.com.
- [10] History of the Italian language..
- [11] MORAN, J. i J. A. RABELLA (ed.), Primers textos de la llengua catalana, Proa (Barcelona), 2001, No. ISBN 84-8437-156-5.
- [12] Various texts, among whom the Servaaslegende by Henderik van de Veldeke