page_title: Cushitic peoples
section_title: Languages
hierarchical_section_title: Cushitic peoples / Languages
caption_attribution_description: English: Afroasiatic languages ca. 500 BC using data gathered from Cohen (M.) 1924 Français&#160;: Les langues chamito-sémitiques au ve siècle avant J.-C. (d’après Meillet et Cohen, 1924).
context_page_description: The Cushitic peoples are a grouping of people who are primarily indigenous to Northeast Africa and speak or have historically spoken Cushitic languages of the Afroasiatic language family. Cushitic languages are spoken primarily in the Horn of Africa, as well as the Nile Valley, and parts of the African Great Lakes region. Some examples of these peoples include the Cushitic speaking ethnic groups.
  Linguistic evidence indicates that Cushitic languages were spoken in Lower Nubia, an ancient region which straddles present day Southern Egypt and Northern Sudan, before the arrival of North Eastern Sudanic languages from Upper Nubia. Many extinct populations of northern Nubia such as the Medjay and the Blemmyes spoke Cushitic languages related to the modern Beja language. Less certain are hypotheses which propose that Cushitic languages were spoken by the people of the C-Group culture in northern Nubia, or the people of the Kerma culture in southern Nubia. Historical linguistic analysis indicates that the languages spoken in the Savanna Pastoral Neolithic culture of the Rift Valley and surrounding areas, may have been languages of the South Cushitic branch.
context_section_description: Cushitic Languages
  The Cushitic languages are usually considered to include the following branches:
  North Cushitic (Beja)
  Central Cushitic (Agaw languages)
  East Cushitic
  Lowland East Cushitic
  Highland East Cushitic
  Yaaku-Dullay
  Dahalo
  South Cushitic
  The Somali language is the sole Cushitic language recognized as an official language while Oromo is recognized as a regional working language in Ethiopia. Afar and Somali are recognized as national languages but are not official languages in Djibouti.
  Extinct Cushitic languages
  Linguistic evidence (according to Claude Rilly 2008, 2010, 2016 and Julien Copper 2017) indicates that in antiquity, Cushitic languages were spoken in Lower Nubia, an ancient region which straddles present day Southern Egypt and Northern Sudan, and that Nilo-Saharan languages of the Eastern Sudanic branch were spoken in Upper Nubia to the south (where the ancient Kerma culture was located), before the spread of Eastern Sudanic languages further north into Lower Nubia.
  Julien Cooper (2017) states that in antiquity, Cushitic languages were spoken in Lower Nubia (the northernmost part of modern-day Sudan):
  "In antiquity, Afroasiatic languages in Sudan belonged chiefly to the phylum known as Cushitic, spoken on the eastern seaboard of Africa and from Sudan to Kenya, including the Ethiopian Highlands."
  Julien Cooper (2017) also states that Eastern Sudanic speaking populations from southern and west Nubia gradually replaced the earlier Cushitic speaking populations of this region: 
  "In Lower Nubia there was an Afroasiatic language, likely a branch of Cushitic. By the end of the first millennium CE this region had been encroached upon and replaced by Eastern Sudanic speakers arriving from the south and west, to be identified first with Meroitic and later migrations attributable to Nubian speakers."
  In Handbook of Ancient Nubia, Claude Rilly (2019) states that Cushitic languages once dominated Lower Nubia along with the Ancient Egyptian language. Rilly (2019) states:
  "Two Afro-Asiatic languages were present in antiquity in Nubia, namely Ancient Egyptian and Cushitic."
  Rilly (2019) mentions historical records of a powerful Cushitic speaking race which controlled Lower Nubia and some cities in Upper Egypt. Rilly (2019) states:
  "The Blemmyes are another Cushitic speaking tribe, or more likely a subdivision of the Medjay/Beja people, which is attested in Napatan and Egyptian texts from the 6th century BC on."
  On page 134:
  "From the end of the 4th century until the 6th century AD, they held parts of Lower Nubia and some cities of Upper Egypt."
  He mentions the linguistic relationship between the modern Beja language and the ancient Cushitic Blemmyan language which dominated Lower Nubia and that the Blemmyes can be regarded as a particular tribe of the Medjay:
  "The Blemmyan language is so close to modern Beja that it is probably nothing else than an early dialect of the same language. In this case, the Blemmyes can be regarded as a particular tribe of the Medjay."
  Ethiosemitic Languages
  North Ethiopic
  Ge’ez
  Tigre
  Tigrinya
  Dahalik
  South Ethiopic
  Transversal South Ethiopic
  Amharic – working language of the Federal Government of Ethiopia.
  Harari–East Gurage
  Outer South Ethiopic
  West Gurage
  The historical linguistics of the relationship between Ethiosemitic languages and Cushitic languages is multi-layered and complex, not yet fully understood. Amharic, Argobba and Tigrinya seem to have a Central Cushitic substratum; Tigre contains a North Cushitic substratum while Harari-Gurage languages reveal Highland East Cushitic influences. 
  The Agaw are mentioned in an inscription of the fourth century emperor Ezana of Axum having conquered their lands. Based on this evidence, a number of experts embrace a theory first stated by European scholars Edward Ullendorff and Carlo Conti Rossini that they are the original inhabitants of much of the northern Ethiopian Highlands, and were either forced out of their original settlements or assimilated by Semitic-speaking Tigrayans and Amharas. This theory is further strengthened by the exist
caption: Afroasiatic languages ca. 500 BC[112]
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