South Arabian Languages

South Arabian languages, two groups of Semitic languages in southern Arabia that were formerly thought to constitute a single language group. The languages spoken in modern times are known as the Modern South Arabian languages, while the languages attested in ancient times are known as Epigraphic or Old South Arabian languages.

The Modern South Arabian languages are spoken in southern Arabia and on the island of Socotra. These languages belong to the Southern Peripheral cluster of Semitic languages, along with Geʿez, Amharic, Tigré, Tigrinya, and the other Semitic languages of Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Sudan; the similarities of the languages in this cluster have prompted proposals of a genetic grouping known as South or Southwest Semitic. Dialects include Mahrī (Mehri), Shaḥrī (Eḥkalī; Jibbali), Ḥarsūsī, and Baṭḥarī on the Arabian shore of the Indian Ocean and Soqoṭrī on Socotra. Ḥarsūsī has been influenced by Arabic, a northern Arabian language, to a greater extent than have the other dialects. These languages lack a tradition of writing, and thus almost nothing is known of them before the 19th century.

The Epigraphic or Old South Arabian languages, sometimes called Ṣayhadic to disambiguate from the Modern South Arabian languages, include the extinct languages Minaean, Sabaean, Qatabanian, and Ḥaḍramawtian . The earliest Old South Arabian inscriptions, dating from the 8th century bce, are in the Minaean dialect. Sabaean is the dialect of the majority of South Arabic inscriptions; the latest inscriptions are from the 6th century ce. The type of Semitic alphabet in which the ancient inscriptions are written has 29 consonant signs but does not indicate vowels.