Semitic is a branch of the Afroasiatic language family spoken across the Middle East and North Africa, including living languages such as Arabic, Hebrew, Amharic, Tigrinya and Aramaic, alongside extinct languages such as Akkadian and Phoenician. With more than 300 million speakers, chiefly of Arabic, it is the most widely spoken branch of Afroasiatic.
Facts
RegionWest Asia, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, and Malta, with additional immigrant and expatriate communities in North America, Europe, and Australasia 1 Speaker Count Proto-Language StatusReconstructed as Proto-Semitic, a reconstruction originally based primarily on the conservative phonology and morphology of Arabic 1 In the Other Atlases
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Akkadian, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Arabic, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Arabs, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Aramaic, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Assyrians, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Babylonians, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Biblical Hebrew, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Canaanites, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Classical Arabic, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Classical Mandaic, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Classical Syriac, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Ge'ez, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Hebrew, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Israelites, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Mesopotamians, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Old Egyptian, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Old South Arabian, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Phoenicians, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Samaritans, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: Ugaritic, includes there.
- Also in Divinity Atlas: West Semitic, includes there.
- Also in Geography Atlas: Africa, found in there.
- Also in Geography Atlas: Asia, found in there.
- Also in Geography Atlas: Australasia, found in there.
- Also in Geography Atlas: Europe, found in there.
- Also in Geography Atlas: North Africa, found in there.
- Also in Geography Atlas: North America, found in there.
- Also in Geography Atlas: The Horn of Africa, found in there.
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Semitic Languages
WikipediaLead section, paragraph 1: geographic distribution sentence
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.
Lead section, paragraph 1: population figure sentence
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.
Historical linguistics section: Proto-Semitic reconstruction basis
The reconstruction of Proto-Semitic (PS) was originally based primarily on Arabic, whose phonology and morphology (particularly in Classical Arabic) is very conservative, and which preserves as contrastive 28 out of the evident 29 consonantal phonemes.
View the Source Wikidata: Semitic
Reader Challenges (0)
No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.
Sign in to dispute this or suggest a correction.